Dragonship
by Thomas Mc
Summary: The Brainship Hypatia and her Brawn Alexander are making an extensive survey of all of the known failed human colonies when they encounter something totally unexpected at a planet called P.E.R.N that was supposed to be totally uninhabitable.
1. Another Failed Colony

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

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_**Author's Note: **______This story has been rattling around in my head for a very long time and I finally just had to try to give it life. I really would like to get some feedback on this one.  
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_______Brainship Hypatia and her Brawn Alexander are making an extensive survey of all of the known failed human colonies when they encounter something totally unexpected at a planet that was supposed to be totally uninhabitable. This is a crossover between Anne McCaffery's Dragon Rider series and The Ship Who Searched. This story is set 5 turns after The Skys of Pern and 8 years after The ship Who Searched.  
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**Chapter 1 : Another Failed Colony**

For Hypatia Cade, Tia to her friends, the brainship part of the brain-brawn team designated AH-1033, life was good. Her hull was the newest and most advanced model currently in production from Central Planets and, even better, she owned it outright. She had also spared no expense in outfitting her passenger cabins for the maximum comfort of any VIP's that she might be called upon to transport. Hypatia was a shell person and the brain of her ship. Tia's real human body resided in a titanium shell that was sealed and mounted inside the virtually impervious central column that ran half the length of her ship. Tia's shell also held the complex self-contained life-support systems that kept her nerveless paralyzed body alive as well as the myriad of ultra fine wires connecting her brain to the rest of the ship. Baring some catastrophic event that completely destroyed the ship, she could expect many hundreds of years of life span. To Tia the ship was her body. She saw, heard, and felt through the thousands of ships sensors and every function within her ship was directly controlled by her will. As a brainship she was able to run freely through space as easily as someone might run through a grassy meadow or dive through a singularity like a surfer shooting the curl. She wouldn't trade the freedom and adventure of her current life for anything.

Best of all her recent improvements was her brand new 'avatar' body. It was Moto-Prosthetics Corporation's latest model of synthetic human body. It was so close to normal mass for her dimensions that most people could not tell the difference. The sensory systems throughout the avatar mimicked 'all' the sensory nerves and the control systems perfectly mimicked the muscles of a living body. The comlink-systems were so much more sophisticated than previous models that it truly felt like it was her own body, especially where it really counted (when she was with Alex). With the addition of her synthetic body she had everything that a normal person could have without the bothersome mortality issues. If something destroyed her synthetic avatar body (like the collapsing wall that destroyed her last one) she simply had Moto-Prosthetics build her a new one.

The state-of-the-art AI computers she had purchased for her ship also allowed her to spend more time in her avatar body while cruising in normal space. The new super high traffic comlink module she had added to the communications turret on the outside of her hull gave her nearly three times the range that she was able to wander from her ship without losing full control of her avatar body. When combined with the portable repeater module it gave her a maximum excursion range of almost fifty kilometers from her ship.

Moto-Prosthetics, the manufacturers of her synthetic body, had become a financial juggernaut over the last eight years and she owned seventy-five percent of the stock, making her independently wealthy. On top of that, the EsKay home world expedition had been hailed as one of the greatest archeological finds of all time. This had made her and Alex famous as contract members of one the top archeologist teams currently active. There had even been two major popular holo's come out about the Brainship, Hypatia, and her Brawn Alexander. One holo was about their short stint hunting artifact smugglers, the other was about the discovery of the EsKay home world.

One important aspect of finding the EsKay home world was the discovery of the source of the nasty little virus that had wiped out Hypatia's nervous system. It was the same virus that eventually wiped out the EsKays. The **most** important aspect of that expedition however was the discovery of a wide spectrum cure for a whole host of nerve destroying diseases including the one that got her. At one time she would have welcomed a cure for that disease but now she wouldn't trade her current life as Hypatia-1033 for anything.

As for her personal life, the love affair between her and her Brawn, Alexander, had become the stuff of legend. Among those in the Brain-Brawn Service, it rivaled even Helva-834 and her Brawn Niall Parollan. The pride she sensed in the many communications from her parents was particularly gratifying. Long forgotten was the pain they had felt over what the EsKay nerve disease had done to her; to be replaced by the pride and joy they felt for her accomplishments as a shell person and as a 'famous' brainship. She still savored the memories of her parent's visit just before this current mission began. One keepsake from that visit was a picture of her new synthetic body with Alex on one side and her parents on the other and her newly outfitted ship in the background. That picture was mounted on the wall next to the display case containing her little blue teddy bear in the Courier Service t-shirt (A gift from another brainship given to her a year before she became a shell person)..

For the last two years, Tia and Alex had been taking part in a massive new project to survey every known human colonization attempt that had been lost. Some of them had merely lost contact; some had gone astray; some had been abandoned. The saddest of all were those that simply died out. The last two dead colonies had been pretty bad. One had been wiped out by an unknown disease, which happened far too often. The other was destroyed when the planet had been hit by a meteor large enough to disrupt the most of the surface crust of the planet. Both of those had been pretty depressing.

The latest target of their survey was a failed colony attempt on a planet listed in the official records under the acronym P.E.R.N.\C 273 in the Rukbat star system. "I can find no other references on that particular acronym. The original survey records gave no other designation for it; though the logs of the original rescue effort listed it as Pern. This was the only possibly habitable system near a recently discovered singularity point." Tia reported. She and Alex continued studying all the existing records of the original colonization attempt and the report of the rescue of the few remaining survivors. The reports of the rescue mission were pretty definite about the planets unsuitability. There was a fairly complete report on the cause of the colony's demise. As a result, extensive investigation was not necessary. This would just be a standard orbital survey of the original colony sites purely for the sake of completeness. They probably wouldn't even need to touch down on the planet. Then it would be on to the next target star system.

Alex and Tia were sitting side by side going over the rescue mission report while her ship continued onward under control of the AI computers. They were both startled by the collision alarm followed immediately by the sound of hundreds of tiny particles hitting her hull's outer skin at thousands of meters per second. Instantly Tia's synthetic body froze in place as she shut down all the links between her synthetic body and herself as her meteor shields automatically powered up. Tia was once again the ship. A quick check of all her sensors assured her that her hull had, so far, taken no damage from the still continuing bombardment.

Tia's voice now came from the main cabin speaker. "Alex, I've scanned the area and the particles we are passing through are of relatively light mass. They appear to be made mostly of ice and semi-biological matter. There is no immediate danger to my hull, but I think it is best if I maintain control for now. Would you stow my body in its closet for me? Then I want you strapped in, just in case I have to make any sudden maneuvers."

"Sure thing, Love." Alex nodded towards the central column that dominated the control room. He stood up and gave a jaunty salute to the fuzzy blue teddy bear sealed in its glass case, (an artifact of Tia's childhood). "You have the comm. Captain Bear." Alex stowed the apparently lifeless body of his lover it in the coffin size closet that Tia had ordered built into the corner of her control room, specifically to store her synthetic human body when she wasn't using it. As he closed the closet door, Alex glanced at the small picture of an adorable eight year old girl that had been mounted on the wall next to it. It was the last picture taken of Tia before she had been stuck down by the terrible disease that had nearly destroyed her nervous system.

Meanwhile, Tia had taken in a couple of the pebble sized fragments through a small remote controlled sampling airlock for compositional analysis. Half an hour later she had the results. "Alex." She announced. "This stuff is biologically active. It's alive. I've placed samples in the bio-scanner for a more complete breakdown of it. The analysis should be complete in an hour."

The density of the ort cloud they were passing through increased so Tia reduced her speed and used the extra energy to boost power to her shields.

Once the analysis was completed Tia reported on the data from the bio-scanner. "I've got the results on what's inside the Ice pellets." There was a momentary pause, much longer than normal. "Alex, this is nasty stuff. It eats anything that is even remotely biological. If this were to fall onto a planet, it could probably strip that planet of all life in a matter of weeks." If Tia could have shuddered inside her titanium shell, she would have. As it was, she had to adjust her nutrient intake in order to keep her composure.

Alex had no such restrictions and his reaction was enough for both of them. "Could that be what wiped out the original colony? What does the rescue report say?"

Tia called up the original report from her data banks. "That's what the rescue ship reported. It says that they found the surface pockmarked with large area's totally denuded of vegetation. The report also states that a small mercury sized planet, with a highly elliptical orbit, passes through the ort cloud once every two hundred and fifty years. Then it swings in close to the inner planets, trailing a long tail of this stuff. According to this, the particles fall on the planet like a deadly rain. It wiped out the colony a couple of years after they arrived. That was about two thousand years ago." Again Tia had to adjust her nutrient intake to remain calm as she contemplated the kind of devastation that deadly rain of horror must have produced the first time it fell on the unsuspecting new colonists.

The whisper of the particles hitting the hull dwindled and Tia announced that they were emerging from the ort cloud. She began her survey of the planetary system and displayed the results on the main display screen. She started highlighting the points of interest as she described them. "There are seven planetary bodies in this system. This is the planet they labeled as P.E.R.N 273. The cometary body is just past its closest point here. Those parabolic smears are the trail of particles from the cloud. The third through the sixth planets all pass through that stuff and pull it into their own orbits. From then on they would experience periodic falls of the material until their orbits are eventually swept clean of it. It should take between forty and seventy years to completely clear out that stuff, by which time there would be very little left alive."

Alex shook his head. "Not a very pretty picture."

Tia was running orbital calculations when an anomaly popped up. "Alex, there's something odd here."

He could hear the uncertainty in her voice. "What is it Tia?"

"One moment, I'm recalculating." She was silent for several seconds. "I've calculated the rogue's orbit and it doesn't match the expected path of the tail. In fact on its current orbital path, the tail wouldn't come near the inner planets. And its orbital period is closer to three-hundred-fifty years."

Alex looked over at her central column. "Maybe there is another cometary body that we haven't found yet."

Tia reached out with her sensors at their most sensitive, scanning the entire planetary system. Finally she reported the results. "That's the only large cometary body that even comes close to the original reports, Alex." She sounded puzzled by the results. "I have located an artificial satellite orbiting the planet we're interested in."

Alex blinked at the sudden shift in subject then caught up. "Did you find any kind of activity?"

"So far all I've got is the beacon signal from one of the colony transports." Tia reported then she changed subjects again. "We should be close enough to make orbit in five hours. "

Alex nodded towards her central column. "I'll study the background reports to see if I can find an explanation for these anomalies while you scan the system and guide us in." He walked into the galley and fixed himself a sandwich while Tia's servos prepared coffee for him. Taking the coffee and sandwich, he returned to the control room, plopped down into one of the two acceleration chairs, flipped on one of the unused screens and began to go back over all the reports related to the Rukbat system looking for anything they might have missed.

After about an hour Alex looked up. "You know Tia, according to this info, the planet is poor in industrial and military resources but it's very rich in gems and it **was** rich in biological resources. The original colonists apparently wanted to get away from the constant warfare of that time and chose this planet because it had nothing worthwhile for the military interests and appeared to be perfectly suited for an agrarian society."

"Sounds like paradise, except for the slight inconvenience of that nasty parasite from the ort cloud." There was a bit of both regret and sarcasm in her voice.

~ o ~

As Tia eased into a geosynchronous orbit near the ancient colony ship, Alex was studying the displayed images of it as it was now and as it had last appeared to the original rescue mission. "Tia, do you see this? The entire engine structure is missing from that ship."

"I noticed that." Tia responded.

Several indicators on the instrument panel bleeped once, startling Alex. "Tia, what was that?"

"We've just been scanned." She replied.

"Where did it come from?"

"It came from that old relic out there. The scan was very primitive, couldn't have gotten much more than our basic configuration. Apparently that old wreck is getting just enough power from its solar panels for orbit maintenance and planetary observation."

"And to scan us." Alex added. "It's fascinating the odd bits we find left behind by these dead colonies."

Tia consulted the records from the Central Planets Colonization Service. "There were originally three ships in the fleet that came here. They were already obsolete when they were purchased outright for this last expedition." She continued scanning the surrounding space. "Alex, I found the other two colonization ships close by. They're also missing their engines. They're both totally dead. They don't even have their solar panels."

Alex responded, "That would probably explain those extra solar panels I see tacked onto the still active ship." He scratched his head. "So, what happened to those ships engines and who moved the solar panels?"

"I don't know. I've scanned the planet and there are no signs of atomic power. If the engines had somehow been moved to the surface as a source of power, I would have been able to detect them." She sounded puzzled. "Alex, the surface is covered with lush vegetation so there is plenty of life down there, in spite of the incursions of those deadly ort cloud spores."

Alex gave an exasperated sigh. "So what happened here, Tia? There are plenty of signs that extensive technological activity has taken place around those ships, but no indication who could have done it or why." He shook his head. "And no signs of any type of high tech civilization." He studied at the screens for a few minutes then turned towards her central column. "Tia, could it have been …"

"Uh, Alex, I think we have visitors." Tia interrupted with a distinct tone of surprise to her voice.

Alex turned back to face the image that was now displayed on the main view screen and remarked in a startled voice. "What the . . ."

**____****Continued in Part 2**

___( rev 130520 )_

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___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and_'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	2. A Very Unusual Visitor

** Dragonship**  
_By Thomas Mc  
_

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**Chapter 2 : A Very Unusual Visitor**

Alex stared in stunned amazement at the display from Tia's main forward video screen. The large main screen was showing what could only be described as a large white dragon floating in open space about thirty meters away from them. The data on the object began appearing on the upper right corner of the main screen and on the smaller data analysis screen of the main console. The beast was 5.7 meters long and it had a 7.2 meter wingspan. Oddly, the mass of the beast seemed to be in almost continuous fluctuation. Other indications showed that it was most definitely a living creature.

The white dragon was slowly fanning its wings as though trying to attract their attention. The beast appeared to be looking back at them with multifaceted eyes that seemed to reflect all the colors of the rainbow. Most unusual of all, there appeared to be a human, space-suited, figure perched on the dragon where its neck met its shoulders.

After a moment Alex spoke. "Tia, are we seeing what I think we're seeing." He shook his head. "That **is** a dragon out there, isn't it? I mean as in, out of Saint George and all those classic fantasy stories, dragon?"

Tia responded with a hint of awe in her voice. "I'm seeing the same thing. All the data that I'm scanning says that it is real. I keep half expecting to see it spew fire from its mouth at any moment."

"But where did that thing come from?" Alex asked. He could swear that it had not been there a few seconds ago and there had been no warning from Tia's collision sensors.

"I don't know. It didn't approach, it just appeared." Tia responded. "One instant there was empty space, the next instant that . . . **dragon** was floating out there in front of us, its velocity perfectly matched to ours." There was a moment of silence as they studied the image on the screen then Tia spoke, her voice indicating surprise. "Alex, look at this."

A new scene appeared on a one of the main console monitors. It showed the outer hatch of Tia's main airlock. There appeared to be three miniature dragons, less than three-quarters of a meter in wingspan, perched on the external handholds and beating on the hatch with their wings.

Alex shook his head. "I swear it looks, for all the world, like they are knocking at your door wanting to be let in." Alex looked back over at her central column. He was torn between extreme caution and extreme curiosity. "What do you think, Tia? Should we let them in?"

After a few moments she responded to him. "Might as well." If she could have shrugged inside her shell she would have. "See what happens. If it looks like they are hostile, I can just hit them with a dose of sleepy gas and toss them back out the airlock." She opened the outer airlock door. "Besides I'm curious."

As soon as the outer hatch had opened wide enough the three mini-dragons launched themselves, through the growing opening, into the airlock and immediately started beating on the inner hatch.

"They are definitely showing signs of more intelligence than I would have given them credit for." Tia remarked in surprise.

Alex noticed that since they had first become aware of that dragon, every time Tia spoke she sounded surprised. Of course Alex had been in a continual state of surprise himself since the dragon's appearance as well. He was beginning to wonder what other strange surprises were in store for them. His curiosity and his sense of adventure were both drawing him in.

Tia closed the outer hatch. The miniature dragons perched on convenient hand holds and stared expectantly at the inner door. She began pressurizing the air lock much slower than normal since she was unsure how the tiny creatures might react to a sudden change in pressure. After a few seconds Tia noticed that the miniature dragons ignored the inrushing air as though they expected it and remarked on their behavior. "They act as though they know what an airlock is and how it works."

Alex had come to the same conclusion. "I'll go down to meet them." He announced as he stood up and started making his way out of the control room.

"Alex, put on your spacesuit first. We have no idea what types of pathogens they might be carrying. You know that you need to be careful about the risks of biological contamination." Tia admonished him as she monitored the rising air pressure and the way the creatures reacted to the change. They would periodically fan their wings as though testing the density of the rising air pressure.

While Alex donned his space suit, Tia turned on the artificial gravity in the airlock. The little creatures squawked and flapped their wings at this new development. They had taken the rising air pressure in stride but the artificial gravity had surprised them. After a few seconds they calmed down as they adjusted to the new situation. As the air pressure in the airlock slowly rose Tia was studying the little creatures. Each of them was a different color. The two smaller ones were green and blue. The larger one was a very distinctive golden hue. Tia thought that they were all three actually quite lovely and graceful creatures.

About a minute after Alex arrived at the airlock the pressure reached ship nominal. Tia waited another five minutes before opening the inner hatch. The three mini-dragons flew in and hovered in front of Alex. The inner airlock hatch swung shut. Inside the airlock a small portal opened drawing in a sample of the air.

"They seem to be waiting for you to guide them." Remarked Tia over the suit's intercom.

Alex turned and headed back to the control room. The three mini-dragons followed him swooping around and twittering excitedly as they followed.

Tia again commented to Alex over the suits intercom. "I swear it looks like they are discussing their surroundings as they follow you." Once they reached the control room the three mini-dragons settled onto open areas on the main control panel and proceeded to look around as if they were memorizing the layout of the cabin. Alex noticed that they had carefully selected spots where they wouldn't accidentally touch any of the controls. He also noticed that they seemed to be paying an inordinate amount of their attention looking at Tia's central column.

"Now what?" Alex asked as he eyed the actions of the little miniature dragons.

"I don't know." Tia responded.

The larger golden miniature dragon took wing then vanished into thin air, right before their eyes. Alex stood there looking into the space so recently vacated, too startled to react.

"Alex! That mini-dragon just appeared next to the space suited figure on that white dragon out there."

A minute later the miniature dragon reappeared in the control room and dropped a four inch long cylinder onto the main control console.

"Alex! Don't touch that! Let me check it out." Several indicator lights on the control panel changed, showing that the ship was now completely under control of the AI computers, then Tia's tiny storage closet opened and her avatar body stepped out, causing a great deal of chirping among the mini-dragons. "Alex, back away while I check it out. This body is replaceable, yours isn't."

The green mini-dragon flew over and checked out the small interior of the storage closet as Tia picked up the cylinder and examined it. The cylinder turned out to be hollow and, when opened, a rolled-up sheet fell out of it. On the film in large block letters was a short message written in an archaic form of common,

"May I have permission to come aboard?" Tia read then showed it to Alex.

"At least he's very polite about his request." Alex shrugged glancing at her. "I'm most definitely becoming very curious about all this, how about you?"

"I'm feeling the same way." She replied with a matching shrug. "Might as well let him in and see what he wants. With the apparent ability displayed by those miniature dragons, It might not be a good idea to antagonize them or their associates." She pulled a marker from a small drawer under the instrument panel then wrote the single word, 'YES' At the bottom of the sheet. She placed it back in the cylinder and handed the cylinder to the nearest of the little creatures. That creature promptly disappeared. Then she walked back to her closet, stepped inside and closed the door. After running a quick systems check and activating the padded bracing that protected her synthetic body when not in use, she turned off the lights and diagnostic indicator panels inside the closet then shut her synthetic body down.

Once again, she was the ship. She reveled momentarily at the feeling of freedom and power that came with having a brainship as her body entailed then turned her attention to what was going on both outside and inside her ship body. She observed that the remaining two creatures were again paying an inordinate amount of attention to her central column and had began twittering back and forth. On the main screen, the little messenger had reappeared beside the space-suited figure. After a short time the creature returned to the control room.

This time Tia was watching and her recorders were running at high speed. She detected a faint shimmer as the white dragon disappeared. A half second later, the great beast reappeared floating next to her airlock. "Alec, I was watching closely that time and that beast just teleported. It quite literally vanished then sixty-seven milliseconds later it reappeared beside my airlock." Her voice took in a puzzled tone. "What I don't understand, though, is where were they during the half a second that they apparently ceased to exist?"

Alex turned from the view screens. "Maybe we can ask them later, but for now I guess you'd better let the person in the spacesuit, whoever or whatever he is, in." He shrugged.

Tia activated the outer airlock door. Just as she opened it, the space suited figure pushed off of the dragon and floated into the airlock.

As soon as the outer door closed, the white dragon vanished. The golden mini-dragon vanished and reappeared inside the airlock next to the suited figure. The mini-dragon settled onto a padded area on the shoulder of the space suited visitor as the air rushed into the airlock. He stood there patiently waiting.

As soon as Alex arrived at the airlock Tia opened the inner hatch. The visitor removed his helmet and gloves then reached up to pet the little creature on his shoulder. The visitor turned out to be a pleasant looking, middle aged, man, graying at the temples, with an open smile and curious, friendly eyes. "Welcome aboard the AH1033." Alex greeted the stranger. "My name is Alexander Joli-Chanteu. You can call me Alex."

"And I am Hypatia Caide. I usually go by Tia to my friends." Tia announced over the intercom above the inner airlock hatch.

The visitor glanced up at the speaker above the hatch a moment then looked back at Alex. He stepped through the hatchway into the corridor. "Glad to meet you and welcome to Pern. I am Jaxom, Lord Holder of Ruatha. He had a fairly thick accent and his phrasing was just a bit odd.

Catching the slight emphasis on the title, Tia asked. "How do you prefer to be addressed?"

"Lord Jaxom, Lord Holder Jaxom, or just Lord Holder are all equally acceptable." He replied.

"If you will come this way Lord Jaxom." Alex indicated the way toward the control room.

As the visitor stepped up next to Alex, the airlock hatch closed. At the same time a small sampling port just inside the hatch again opened to take a sample of the air.

Together, Alex and Jaxom headed towards the control room with the three miniature dragons flitting around them. It was apparent to both Alex and Tia that Jaxom already knew the way.

As they entered the control room Jaxom glanced curiously at the door to the closet where Tia kept her synthetic body stored. The three miniature dragons continued exhibiting an inordinate amount of attention to the central column that dominated the control room. Jaxom's expression showed curiosity, wariness and uncertainty as his eyes swept the length and diameter of the central column but he said nothing.

Normally having so much attention being paid to Tia's central column wouldn't have bothered Alex, since it was supposed to be impossible for anyone to get access to her, but he had seen these creatures teleport in and out of the ship so what could keep them from teleporting into the cavity where her shell was mounted. It would take only a second to do massive amounts of damage to her support systems or even disconnect her brain from the ship network. They could easily destroy her and disable the ship.

Shortly after they entered the control cabin Tia announced. "Alex, the air samples have tested negative for any dangerous pathogens. It should be safe to remove your helmet."

Alex removed his helmet and gloves. "Thank you, Tia." He faced their visitor. "This is much better. One of the greatest dangers of our job is unknown diseases so we have to be cautious when we encounter people that are new to us." He pointed to one of the two seats at the control consoles. "Won't you have a seat and we can talk?"

Jaxom took the indicated seat and Alex took the other one. After a second Alex spoke. "So, Lord Jaxom, to what do we owe the honor of your visit to our ship?"

Jaxom glanced again at the central column, where the mini-dragons continued to center their attention, with a puzzled frown then returned his gaze to Alex. "The purpose of my visit is to find out where you are from and why you have come to Pern."

Alex paused a moment at the realization that the planet's catalog designation acronym had become its name. "Our current mission is to catalog all lost or failed human settlement attempts and ascertain the cause of the settlement's failure if possible." He shrugged. "Our records show that a rescue team was dispatched to this planet over two thousand years ago, based on a call for help shortly after all communication with this planet was lost." Alex shrugged. "The report said that the planet was totally unsuitable for human habitation."

_**Continued in Part 3**_

_( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and _'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	3. Planet Fall and a Ruathan Welcome

** Dragonship**  
_By Thomas Mc  
_

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******Chapter 3 : Planet Fall and a Ruathan Welcome**

Alex called up the two thousand year old report from the rescue mission to Pern and placed it on the video screen closest to Jaxom as he spoke. "According to the report from the rescued survivors, the entire rest of the colony was wiped out. The complete report is displayed on that screen behind you."

Jaxom turned to the screen and after a few moments figured out how to operate the viewer. He spent the next few minutes scanning through the report with a couple of stops to read a passage or study an image. He turned back to Alex. "Would it be possible to make me a printed copy of this report?"

"That will be no problem." Tia responded over the speaker in the console. A second later seventeen sheets of printed film were ejected out of a slot next to the screen.

Jaxom calmly took the slim stack of pages and leafed through it. Then he looked over at the mini-dragons clustered by the central column. A second later the largest, golden colored, one flew over to Jaxom. He stared hard at the Mini-dragon then rolled up the pages and handed them to the little creature. After a second to secure its hold on the rolled pages the creature took wing and vanished. "The Master Harper will find that information very interesting." With that rather enigmatic remark Jaxom turned his attention to Alex.

Alex had glanced over at Tia's main control cabin video sensor mounted on the central column. The look in his eyes spoke volumes. He and Tia both had noticed that, although there had been no signs of any kind of advanced technology on the planet, Lord Jaxom was not overawed by all of the high tech on display in the control cabin.

Jaxom looked back at Alex taking in his glance toward that column that dominated the control room. "You said that you were compiling a record of failed colonies. What will be done with this information?"

Alex responded. "The records and surveys will be placed in the historical archives. If a colony is still surviving they will try to reestablish contact and provide any help that may be needed or send a rescue mission if required. If the colony is dead but the cause of its demise can be easily dealt with then I suspect it will be placed on the list of planets available for colonization. Those planets that are too dangerous for human life will probably be put under interdiction."

Jaxom thought a moment. "What about Pern?"

Tia answered him. "That is difficult to say. All of the indications, from previous reports and from what we encountered on our way in, are that this planet is just as dangerous as that report from the rescue mission said, yet you are here and it appears that humans have managed to survive the hostile environment for over two thousand years. It is difficult to predict what Central Worlds will decide."

Jaxom was considering Tia's response when the little gold mini-dragon reappeared. It was carrying what appeared to be a small patch of some type of flexible material with writing on it. Jaxom glanced at it then stuffed it into a pocket. "Why don't you come down to the planet so you can meet more of our people and we can get to know you?"

Alex paused a bit warily and Tia spoke up. "That would be acceptable. Now that we know that there is a viable colony here, we would want to do that anyway."

Alex nodded; Tia was right though he still felt uneasy about it. On the ground Tia would be vulnerable yet with these teleporting mini-dragons that may just be a moot point. "Where should we put down?"

"Can you get a map of the surface of Pern on one of these screens?" Jaxom asked.

Immediately an image of Pern appeared filling the large main view screen. A moment later, numbered longitude and latitude lines were imposed over the image. After a second the cloud layer disappeared leaving the land masses clearly displayed. Jaxom studied the image for several seconds. "Can you set the grid for ninety degrees of north and south latitude and twenty-four hours of longitude with the one hour meridian on the western most tip of the northern continent?" There was a shift in the grid lines and new numbers appeared next to them. "Good now enlarge the area at 3.8 hours of longitude and 39 degrees north of latitude." The image zoomed in on the area specified. "Move in a little closer." The image enlarged. Jaxom pointed to a rocky looking area on the image. "There at the top of that cliff. That is the fire heights of Ruatha. It should make a good solid place for you to set down unless you need more room to land."

Tia studied the area a moment then marked the proposed landing spot on the image while displaying the exact coordinates in the upper right corner. More information appeared in the lower left corner of the screen as Tia scanned the area for composition and stability. The cliff and surrounding area was composed of mostly dense shale; more than adequate to support a ship of her size. After several seconds Tia responded. "That does look like a good spot to land. There is more that adequate room. If you will both strap in I will begin landing procedures."

Jaxom observed Alex fastening the safety webbing and followed his example. He then watched curiously as Alex seemed to relax and take no more interest in the control panel. He noticed that Alex was now watching the large main screen and looked over to see that they were already dropping toward the surface. He glanced back at the still quiescent Alex then his gaze shifted to the dominant central column. Apparently the female that the fire-lizards had seen earlier was the one responsible for piloting this vessel. What he couldn't understand was why she stayed in the relatively small cylindrical room rather than out here in the main control room.

His attention was drawn back to the main screen as the surface of Pern grew rapidly closer. He could worry about the mysteries surrounding that girl and the odd way the fire-lizards reacted to her later. For now he was fascinated with watching what it was like to approach Ruatha from all the way out in space rather than simply popping, almost instantly between, from space to just a few hundred feet above ground. It was an experience both frightening and exhilarating.

~ o ~

As they were rapidly approaching the rocky top of the cliff, where Lord Jaxom had directed them to land, Tia was continually scanning the landing area. She spotted the white dragon circling about a hundred meters above the cliff and about three hundred meters north of the spot Lord Jaxom had designated as their landing site. She noticed that the solid rocky ground above the cliff had been artificially smoothed off and there were a complicated series of thin channels cut into the rock. She could also detect a complicated set of both natural and artificial interconnected caves at the base of the cliff. There were also several stone structures constructed outward from the cliff base. Altogether it gave the appearance of a nearly impregnable fortress.

As they got closer Lord Jaxom indicated a shallow artificial depression that appeared to be scorched and blackened, telling them to land over that spot. A few minutes later Tia had set herself down precisely where the man had indicated. Seconds later the white dragon settled to the ground about fifty meters from the ship.

Moments after touching down, most of the instruments and screens on the control console when dead. Alex released his safety webbing and stood up. "Shall we go Lord Jaxom?"

At this point Lord Jaxom glanced again curiously at the central column then addressed Alex. "Where is your companion that was in this room earlier?"

Tia responded through the speaker mounted on the central column. "I will join you just as soon as I finish securing the ship."

Alex led Jaxom downward past the airlock and into a large cargo compartment. Over to one side Jaxom noticed two flying grav-sleds similar to the one that had been discovered in those caves on the southern continent. Alex had just finished releasing the storage clamps from the smaller of the two craft and was moving it out away from its storage place when the young woman entered the cargo hold.

Jaxom noticed that the fire-lizards tended to shy away from the girl. There was something about her that disturbed them. When he had queried them, they could only say that she was not there.

The three of them climbed into the grav-sled and two seconds later a large section of the wall opened up and Alex guided the sled out of the ship. Alex noticed that all the way down to the base of the cliff the fire-lizards, (that was what Jaxom had called them), were maintaining their distance while at the same time paying an inordinate amount of attention to Tia.

As they approached the enclosed courtyard of the cliff side fortress a woman came out the large door in the cliff wall and stood waiting for them to land. As soon as they touched down the woman approached and Jaxom jumped out of the sled and embraced her.

Alex and Tia stepped out of the sled and Jaxom turned to face them. "Alex, Tia, this is my wife Sharra. Sharra, Alexander and Hypatia are new visitors from beyond our planet."

Sharra looked at them a bit warily then looked at Jaxom. At his encouraging smile she turned back to Tia and Alex. "Welcome to Ruatha Hold."

Jaxom spoke next. "It is getting late. Please come inside." He glanced momentarily at Sharra. "You have arrived right at mealtime. You are welcome to join us for supper and then I will give you a tour of Ruatha Hold."

Jaxom led them through the set of great doors into the fortress hold. Just beyond the doors was a great hall, ten meters by twelve meters, carved into the solid rock of the cliff. There were a dozen people in the hall and the tables had already been set for the evening meal. Sharra called to an apparent servant and ordered him to set two additional places at the head table for their guests. At the end of the hall to the right of the main door was a raised dais with a table on it. There were four place settings already on the table. The servant had an unused table moved from the floor up onto the dais and placed next to the one already there. Two more place settings were arranged on it. Then Alex and Tia were seated at the two new places on the dais. Next to them, in the center, were the empty seats for Jaxom and Sharra and on the other side of the empty seats sat two younger people.

Jaxom indicated the couple on the other end of the table. There was a definite sense of pride in his voice as he introduced them. "This is our youngest son, Tenlan and his new bride Anna. Tenlan will one day take over as lord holder of Ruatha."

Jaxom and Sharra then took their seats. Once the six of them had been seated there was a quick rush as the rest of the people in the hall seated themselves at the lower tables.

During the meal Tia ate very little. Her body was equipped to simulate eating, while analyzing the food to be sure it was safe for human consumption, but she had only a very small storage chamber for the consumed food. She would then report that it was safe to eat over Alex's implanted receiver before he would try it. To Tia all the food that they were served simply analyzed out as safe to eat. For Alex all the food they were served was full of unusual flavors but quite tasty.

Early in the meal Tia asked about something she was curious about. "Lord Jaxom, you introduced Tenlan as your youngest son. I assumed that to mean that you have other children?"

Jaxom nodded and replied. "We have two others. Our eldest son and our daughter both live in Telgar Weyr. That is why our youngest will be the one inheriting the title from me." It was obvious from the tone of Jaxom's voice and the faces of the other family members that this fact was apparently a matter of pride to the family.

For the most part Jaxom managed to skillfully keep the dinner conversation on an innocuously pleasant level. Soft music was supplied by a group of live musicians that took turns between playing and eating. Tia noticed that all of the people at the lower tables were paying a good deal of curious attention to her and Alex. It was obvious from the snatches of conversation that her sharp audio receptors had picked up, that there was a great deal of speculation going on about the both of them.

About halfway through the meal Tia informed Alex over the radio link of something she found very curious and disconcerting. "Alex, that white dragon has been showing an inordinate amount of interest in my ship." She paused a moment then continued. "Also, a couple of times I have seemed to hear a voice that is too faint to make out any words. The weird part is that it's not coming from any of my audio sensors. I've had the AI's monitoring all internal and external sensors and that is not where the voice is coming from."

Alex did not respond but he worried. Tia was far too stable and sensible to be imagining things. So what was it that she thought she was hearing without external stimulus? He filed that away for later discussion when they were alone.

After the meal finished Jaxom and Sharra took their guests on a tour of Ruatha hold. What struck both Tia and Alex was how basically primitive yet comfortable the living conditions were. But they were not entirely without knowledge of technology. In Jaxom's office was a fairly nice computer. Jaxom told them that it was powered by solar cells and storage batteries located at the top of the cliff near the fire heights. There was also a comparatively primitive but functional telegraph setup in the office. They had electricity yet all of interior lighting was supplied by open windows during the day and by small glowing glass spheres containing some type of phosphorescent fungus at night or where outside light couldn't reach.

It was well after dark when the tour of the hold was finished. Sharra invited Alex and Tia to stay the night in one of the hold's guest chambers. After a moment's consideration Alex accepted their invitation.

~ o ~

Shortly after their two unusual guests had been installed in the guest chambers Jaxom sent out a message over the telegraph to The Harper Hall that was to be relayed to all the weyrs and major holds. "Emergency meeting at Ruatha Hold after first meal local time." Then he retired for the night.

As Sharra and Jaxom lay in bed they discussed their visitors. Sharra was commenting on the woman, Tia. "There is something very strange about her. The fire-lizards are all disturbed by her as well. They say that she is not really there. Her mind is cold and empty like the emptiness of between or like someone dead. They all feel it."

Jaxom responded. "I know. Ruth sensed the same thing about the woman. Ruth also informed me that there is someone still inside that ship of theirs. The fire-lizards could also sense her but they were unable to reach her. They think she is trapped in a small dark chamber so tiny that she cannot move but they sense no distress from her at all. She seems to be perfectly content where she is. Ruth tells me that whoever she is, she is sensitive and has tried to speak to her but couldn't get through." He shook his head. "None of it makes any sense."

Sharra caressed his cheek. "Well, don't worry any more about them tonight. Tomorrow morning you will meet with the other Lord Holders and Weyr Leaders. You can decide then what to do with them."

_**Continued in Part 4**_

_( rev 130520 )_

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___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and _'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	4. Dragons ! ! They Have Dragons ! !

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

_**Author's Note: **______I apologize for taking so long in updating this story. As I was preparing this chapter for posting I realized this chapter and the next two chapters just didn't work so now I am having to do something that I try very hard to avoid. From this chapter on I am writing the story as I post it which means the delay between posting each chapter will be longer and most of the chapters will probably be un-beta'ed. My wife (who is also my beta) doesn't like reading unfinished stories any more than I do. Please bear with me and I will get this thing finished as quickly as possible._

* * *

**Chapter 4 : ****Dragons ! ! - They Have Dragons ! !**

Alex felt a tickle at his nose and absently swatted at it. There was nothing there. Again the tickle and again nothing when he swatted at whatever annoying bug was bothering him. A third time the tickle returned accompanied by a nearly suppressed giggle. Alex pried open one eye and saw that it was a wisp of dark hair tickling his nose, the other end of which was attached to Tia. He quickly reached up around her shoulder pulling down and rolling until he was on top of her and began raining kisses in retribution for her little trick. At times like these neither of them was aware that Tia's body was merely a simulacrum.

When all of her direct brain links were fully engaged through the body's comlinks, Tia experienced everything that happened to it. Every physical sensation from the millions of artificial nerves were all fed directly into her living brain and every control servo reacted to her brain like her own muscles. For her, when fully linked in, this was her body. Despite the condition of her true body inside her sealed titanium shell, Tia was still human with all the human feelings and desires. The fact that she had been eight years old with a fully developed personality when sealed into her shell, rather than an infant, made her emotional reactions even more human than a typical shell person.

For Alex, Tia's synthetic body looked, felt and reacted just like the real person that controlled it. When she was fully linked in he could look into her eyes and see her soul reflected there. It was her. The fact that she was made of metal and plastics rather than flesh and blood did not change that fact.

Alexander Joli-Chanteu and Hypatia Cade were deeply and totally head over heels in love with each other and had been since shortly after they had first become 'Brain-Brawn' partners. Tia had commissioned the first synthetic body so that she could once again physically hold another human being, specifically Alex. By the time the current Mark III version had been completed the simulation was so perfect and complete that neither one could tell. They had finally been able to express the physical side of their love as fully as the emotional side.

Just as things were really starting to get interesting the life seemed to go right out of Tia's eyes. Alex pulled back and sat up. He knew what that meant. Something very important had drawn her attention back to her ship and she was only exercising minimal control over this body with the assistance of one of her AI computers. "What is it Tia?" He inquired, a bit breathlessly.

"Alex, the three fire-lizards are back in my control room. They were getting very agitated for a while there but now they seem to have calmed down. Also that big white dragon is squatting right next to me and seems to be studying me." She went quiet for a moment then the life returned to her eyes as she sat up and turned to Alex. "I'm not so sure I li . . ." Her face showed surprise and puzzlement then the eyes went dead again and this time the body froze.

After a few seconds Tia announced in a totally emotionless voice. "Running full system diagnostics." After a couple of minutes the expressionless voice announced. "Phase one, self test, analysis complete." Five minutes later she announced. "Phase two, AI systems, analysis complete." Fifteen minutes passed and the voice announced. "Phase three, Direct link, analysis complete." Ten minutes and the voice announced. "Phase four, comlink, analysis complete." Twelve minutes after that a slightly different voice announced. "Avatar systems test successfully complete." Then the life returned to her eyes.

"Tia, what is it? What happened?" Alex asked anxiously.

Tia shook her head. "I'm not really sure I know what happened, Alex." There were definite signs of worry in her expression. "I, ah . . . I thought I heard a voice . . . possibly more than one voice. They were so faint that I couldn't make out any words. I ran a complete systems diagnostics on all of my systems and there were no detectable signals on any of my direct link lines, comlink lines or AI systems. I'm beginning to wonder if I really heard it or was just imagining it."

Alex shook his head. "Tia, you are one of the sanest people I know. I don't think you're hearing things."

"Then where was it coming from?" She asked plaintively.

At that point a voice outside their guest room announced that breakfast was being served for the next hour. It took them thirty minutes to get ready for the day and make their way down to the main hall. The head table on top of the raised dais was empty. Lord Jaxom and Sharra were both seated at one of the lower tables with several other worker types deep in conversation. Jaxom spotted them and waved them over while speaking to one of the serving people. The server shuffled away as Alex and Tia approached.

Alex and Tia both heard enough of the continuing discussion to realize that they were discussing general Hold business for the day. As Alex and Tia reached the table, the business talk died down. Jaxom stood up and greeted them both. "Good morning." He indicated two vacant seats. "Please be seated. The drudge will bring your breakfast out momentarily"

The discussion of the day's business then resumed with Sharra occasionally adding some clarification for the two guests. Alex in turn would occasionally ask about some element that wasn't quite clear. One item that was brought up by the man that seemed to be some type of general hold manager was the progress of preparations for the expectation of threadfall tomorrow afternoon.

"What exactly is threadfall?" Tia asked.

Everyone looked at Tia in startled surprise. Then Jaxom chuckled and began to explain. "There is a type of space born microscopic life that periodically rains down on the surface of Pern. It is extremely voracious and will consume everything organic that it comes in contact with in a matter of seconds. It is called thread because that is what it looks like, tangles of silvery thread."

Alex and Tia looked at each other and both spoke simultaneously. "The spores from the Ort cloud!"

Alex turned to Jaxom. "That stuff is particularly nasty. How do you survive such a disaster?"

At this point Tia became aware that the fire-lizards had all left the inside of her ship. She was about to tell Alex when a bellowing animal cry was heard coming from outside the hold.

Jaxom had opened his mouth to answer Tia's question when Ruth, his white dragon, informed him that he had many guests arriving at any moment. After acknowledging Ruth's message Jaxom returned his attention to his guests to excuse himself. He paused when he noticed the look on Tia's face suddenly go completely blank and an instant later Alex got a very distracted look on his face. Again Ruth called out a greeting as more guests appeared in the skies over Ruatha Hold.

Tia shut down most of her links to her body at the instant the AI she left monitoring the surrounding environment informed her that several large airborne bodies had just appeared. She was quite surprised by what she saw through the ship's external sensors. "Alex, there are dragons approaching." Tia announced, over the comlink channel to his embedded earpiece. "There are a **lot** of dragons approaching." Alex glanced at Tia and noticed that her movements were stiff and her eyes had the same dead look they got whenever she turned control of her body over to one of her AI computers. That same cry sounded again as Tia continued reporting through the comlink embedded behind Alex's ear. "They just appeared out of nowhere, just like that white dragon did. The white dragon appears to be calling out to them as they appear. There are six . . ." Another cry. ". . . no, seven pairs of dragons consisting of one golden dragon and one slightly smaller bronze colored dragon flying side by side. Alex, those fourteen beasts are huge, more than twice the size of that white dragon of Lord Jaxom. The golden ones have a wingspan of around seventeen meters . . . they are all being accompanied by groups of those little miniature dragons . . . And each of those huge dragons is carrying two or more human riders on its back."

As Tia was transmitting her observations through her comlink to Alex, Alex had been noticing a slightly distracted look on Jaxom's face. It looked like he was listening to something that no one else could hear.

"Tia, are you feeling alright?" Sharra asked, starring at her with a combination of uncertainty and concern.

Tia's attention snapped back to her synthetic body as she turned control of her ships sensors back over to the AI computers. One of them would be in charge of observing and recording the activity outside of the Hold. "I'm bit distracted is all. I'm just fine." After that point Tia and Alex received the same running periodic verbal updates of everything that was going on outside from the AI that she had left in charge.

Outside the Hold each dragon landed in turn in the hold's courtyard, dropped off its passengers, then flew up to the rocky cliff above and settled around Tia's ship. All of the dragons seemed to be very interested in the ship. A servant came over and whispered something to Jaxom. He then excused himself claiming that he had other business to attend to. He arrived at the main Hold doors as a servant pulled them open and met the large group of people that had been arriving in the courtyard. The last of the dragons dropped off its passengers and Jaxom escorted the group of new arrivals through the main hall deeper into the Hold. Several of the group glanced curiously at Alex and Tia as they passed through the hall.

A few minutes later Sharra left the man she called Brand in charge of seeing after Alex and Tia's needs then excused herself. She left the hall heading in the same direction that Jaxom and the other group had gone.

Alex glanced around the now nearly empty hall. "You know, Tia, I think I would like to take a little stroll outside." He shrugged. "Walk off this marvelous breakfast and get a good look at the place." He really wanted to see the new group of dragons that Tia had told him about but he didn't say so since they shouldn't know about them yet. Alex didn't want to give anything away until they had a better idea of their host's motives and intentions.

The man, Brand, nodded acceptance and followed them out into the courtyard.

As soon as they stepped out into the courtyard, Alex noted that the grav-sled was still sitting where he had landed it last night. That was good. Then he let his gaze travel up the rocky face of the hold. He caught sight of a few wing tips but that was all he could see from this vantage point. "That's interesting." He commented. He turned toward the man. "And what do I call you?"

"My name is Brand, Sir." He replied.

Alex responded. "Call me Alex." He nodded toward Tia. ". . . and this is Tia." He again looked up the face of the hold. "I think an aerial view of this place would be very interesting." He then clapped Brand on the shoulder. "Tell me Brand, have you ever flown on a grav-sled?"

"Can't say that I have, sir . . . ah, Alex." Brand replied.

"Well than I think it's about time that you tried something new." He stepped into the sled indicating that Brand should follow. With a shrug and a hint of curiosity Brand stepped onto the grav-sled to be followed by Tia. "Everyone strap in." Alex suggested as they all took seats.

Tia showed Brand how to fasten the safety harness. Alex engaged the controls and the sled smoothly lifted off the ground. At thirty feet they were well above the walls and towers that surrounded the courtyard. Alex swung the sled out and took a long curving course away from the cliff face. As they came around at about a hundred feet out from the cliff traveling slowly parallel to the outer wall they were afforded an excellent view of the hold proper.

Alex looked up and could now see tantalizing glimpses of the dragons perched atop the cliff. "Now that looks interesting." He remarked and started the sled in an upward trajectory. As they came even with the top of the cliff Alex blew out a heavy breath. "Wow, they're huge." The dragons looked a lot bigger than he had expected. Especially compared to the much smaller white dragon. "How many of those beasts are there on this planet?"

Though not addressed directly, Brand answered. "I don't know the exact number, but I think there are about two-thousand dragons."

Alex and Tia glanced at each other. "That is a lot of dragons." Tia remarked. She noticed that all of the dragons had become aware of them and asked a bit nervously. "Are they dangerous?"

Brand shook his head. "No, they're not dangerous. They protect Pern."

Again Alex and Tia looked at each other. They knew that they were both thinking the same thing, '_Just what is it that they protect Pern from?_'

Tia looked over at Brand. "Can all of the dragons teleport into space like that little white dragon?"

Brand seemed puzzled for a moment then understanding hit. "Oh, yes. Being able to jump between is a natural ability for all dragons and fire-lizards."

Tia's brow furrowed. "You said jump between?"

Brand nodded. "That is how they do it. They jump from one place to another by going between."

Tia felt a bit confused by the way he worded his answers. "What do you mean by between? You say that as though 'between' has some special significance that I am missing."

Brad thought for a minute then responded. "Between is like a place that they go during the jump." He hesitated trying to figure out how to describe 'between' to someone that had never experienced it. "Between is total darkness . . . You can't see, hear or feel anything there. And it is cold there, colder than anything you have ever felt." He shivered at the thought of the cold of between. "Fortunately the time spent in between is very short depending on how far you are going."

Tia nodded. "That would explain the short interval between when they disappear and when they reappear somewhere else." As she was thinking she was passing the information to one of her AI's to be codified and stored for later analysis. This was very interesting.

As they circled around over the dragons Alex couldn't help wondering what the existence of those great beasts would mean to Tia and him. He had noticed a hint of ambivalence in both Jaxom and Sharra whenever the subject of their report on this planet came up. He got the distinct feeling that these people really didn't want their existence to be known beyond their planet. What if they decided that it would be better if he and Tia were not allowed to leave to report back. Would they have any chance of escaping this planet against two-thousand dragons that could instantly teleport anywhere at will?

He was also beginning to wonder if that group that had arrived on those dragons was even now discussing what to do about him and Tia. He knew that if Tia had to call for help it could take up to a year before any help could arrive. Alex pushed those concerns aside for the time being as they continued their aerial tour of Ruatha hold.

**____****Continued in Part 5**

___( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and_'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	5. The Meeting

** Dragonship**  
_By Thomas Mc  
_

* * *

**********Chapter 5 : The Meeting**

Jaxom looked out over the group of people gathered in the large meeting room before him. Every one of them wielded great influence in the affairs of the planet Pern, their home. All of the Lord Holders and Weyr Leaders were here along with the masters of all of the craft guilds. All of them had been summoned to Ruatha to discuss the implications of the presence of Alexander and Hypatia and that spaceship of theirs. The noise of all the questions, comments and speculation going on among the excited and worried group was nearly deafening in this enclosed room.

Jaxom already had some idea of what he wanted to come out of this meeting. The trick would be to get the other's to go along. He raised his hands signaling for attention. After a frustrating length of time being ignored by the extremely vocal group, Mastersmith Fandarel noticed Jaxom's vain attempts to obtain order and bellowed for silence. Within seconds the room had quieted to a few whispers. Jaxom stared at the Mastersmith in open admiration. How did he do that?

After a few seconds of stunned silence Fandarel spoke. "The meeting is yours Lord Jaxom."

Jaxom gathered his wits and responded. "Thank you Master Fandarel." He scanned the room full of familiar and curious faces. "I am sure that, as you arrived here this morning, all of you noticed the spacecraft that is currently sitting on Ruatha's fire heights. Since what is happening could potentially affect everyone on Pern I called this meeting of all the Lord holders, Weyr Leaders and Craftmasters in order to consider how best to deal with this unique and surprising development."

Jaxom glanced over to his left where a small knot of people that included F'lar, Lessa, Masterharpers Sebell and Menolly, Mastersmith Fandarel and ex-dragonrider Lytol. Although he had spent the last thirty-five years as Lord Holder of Ruatha Hold as well as becoming the unacknowledged leader of the Lord Holders, the good opinion of those seven people still meant the world to him. They all nodded their approval.

Jaxom launched into a detailed description of the initial discovery of the spaceship's approach by the Yokohama's sensors and his first meeting with Alexander and Hypatia. Then he read to them the report from the rescue mission of 2000 years ago. He finished up with a description of his conversation with the visitors about their mission and what they had told him about the possible options with respect to their final report on Pern. When he had finished there was several seconds of silence as everyone digested everything Lord Jaxom had just told them.

Jaxom was not particularly surprised when Lord Toric was the first to break the silence. "What is the problem?" Toric glanced around contemptuously as though the answer should be obvious. "All we have to do is destroy that spacecraft of theirs so that they cannot leave and report back on us."

There was a general rumbling of agreement from a few of the Lord holders which was met with rumblings of dissention from many of the dragonriders and craft masters.

Then Fandarel spoke out. "We mustn't damage that ship. Think of all the knowledge that it might contain."

More grumblings of agreement with Fandarel spread through the group and it looked like things would soon degenerate into arguments for and against the destruction of Alexander and Hypatia's ship.

Jaxom shook his head. He was also not surprised at the Toric's suggestion. It was so typical of that man's approach to everything. This kind of thinking had to be set aside right up front. He raised his voice to be heard above the rising noise of disagreement. "Destruction of that ship is not a viable option for several reasons." The noise level died down as everyone's attention returned to Jaxom. He gazed around the room noticing the demeanor of those that he figured would be most likely to agree with Toric. "To begin with, I suspect that that spacecraft would not be particularly easy to destroy. Second, according to Ruth and the fire-lizards, there is a third person still aboard that ship and, without any knowledge of what kind of weaponry that craft might have, it would be foolish to make enemies of our visitors." He paused a moment. "I also find the idea of destroying that vessel while there is still someone on board a bit repugnant."

Lord Bargen spoke up. "You could have the dragons move the ship to some place where it can't be found."

Lord Toric jumped in. "Move it to Southern."

Lord Tagetarl retorted. "You would like that wouldn't you; having sole access to the secrets of that ship."

Lord Toric shot back. "That is total foolishness. We must do whatever it takes to make sure that they cannot leave Pern."

Lord Ranrel responded. "We could just grab the two others while they are here at Ruatha and hold them."

Jaxom spoke up. "Those options don't work for the same reason. There is still that third person that has stayed behind in the ship." He shook his head at such heavy handed suggestions. "If we try to detain Alexander and Hypatia, that third person still in the spacecraft could leave and bring back their military."

Again Lord Toric spoke. "Then we get inside and drag that third person out of the ship."

Jaxom shook his head. "Even if we wanted to, I don't think that it can be done. The fire-lizards have tried to get to that person but they are not able to reach her. They say that she is hidden deep inside the ship and there is no open space available where that person is."

Lady Dulsay, wife to Lord Larad and very much his equal, spoke next. "What do you mean by no open space? You make it sound like this poor person is in some tiny cell or" She shuddered. "a crypt."

Jaxom nodded. "Based on what I get from the fire-lizards, that is exactly the way it appears to be. The chamber that this third person occupies is so small that there is no room for the fire-lizards to get in. There also does not appear to be any type of door or hatch to supply access to where she is located. As far as I was able to tell from what I saw and what the fire-lizards found she seems to be completely sealed inside a metal crypt in the center of that ship. There is simply no way to get to her."

"That sounds horrible." Lady Dulsay responded with a shudder.

"You would think so." Jaxom shrugged. "But, according to Ruth, she is quite content where she is and we suspect that she is also capable of controlling the entire ship from her location." He paused to let his last comment sink in. "If we are right then trying to do anything to hinder or disable that ship could be difficult and dangerous."

Jason watched as the low level of rumblings shifted to questions and discussions of this new revelation. Several of them were confused and uncertain about the whole situation presented by that third person that was apparently imprisoned in the ship. Some were wondering about what the situation might be with that person trapped in the ship. Others were just worried about how the situation would affect their ability to maintain Pern's isolation. Lord Toric was still arguing for keeping them from leaving the planet by any means necessary.

Jaxom hesitated to throw out the other bit of information Ruth had given him and debated silently with himself. Meanwhile the rest of the room's occupants debated how they might deal with a person that was supposed to be sealed inside the walls of that ship.

Finally Jaxom decided that the other little bit of information was best brought out now rather than later. Again he raised his voice. "There is one other aspect of this situation that has to be addressed." Again he had their attention. "Ruth has also told me that he thinks the person sealed inside the ship has the ability to talk to the dragons." He paused to let that sink in then continued. "If that is true then the dragons will certainly object to us doing anything that might harm her."

Lord Toric burst out. "The dragons are supposed to protect Pern, not protect those that might harm Pern." He faced the side of the room where most of the dragonriders had congregated. "Just where do the dragon's loyalties lie?" He demanded angrily.

T'gellan jumped angrily to his feet. "The dragons have always been loyal to Pern but we will not harm or kill others just to make your lives easier." His gaze centered on Toric. "Otherwise there are some troublemakers that would not be alive today."

F'lar jumped to his feet and glared at T'gellan. "That is enough." T'gellan sat back down under F'lar's glare. F'lar then faced the rest of the room. "The dragons and dragonriders of Pern are loyal to Pern and will do everything we can to protect Pern but we will not kill in order to do so."

Lord Larad patted his wife's hand then spoke. "What about the other two people from the ship? We could talk to them."

At this point Masterharper Sebell, who had been listening quietly, spoke up. "You are all acting like these visitors are an enemy, here to destroy us. From what Lord Jaxom has found out, they are merely researchers doing a survey to see if any of the lost colonies still exist and to get help for them if they need it. Maybe we should talk to them. Tell them what we, here on Pern, want and see what they say. We can't make an informed decision without all of the available information."

Jaxom responded. "Well spoken Master Sebell." He scanned the hall with his gaze. "I suggest we form a small committee with no more than two representatives of each group, Hold, Craft and Weyr." Each group will choose the representatives from among their members. These representatives will meet with Alexander and Hypatia and discus the situation calmly in a friendly setting."

G'narish slowly rose to his feet. "You all know me. I have spent my entire life fighting to protect Pern from thread, both during all of this pass and the last few years of the last pass over four hundred years ago. If I survive this pass then I hope that Nadira and myself will be able to retire in peace to enjoy our final years together so I do not want outsiders interfering with our home any more than the rest of you. But I don't think violence or force is the way to handle this situation. I believe that Jaxom's idea should be given a chance. It's better than risking an unnecessary war with unknown people from beyond our world."

Jaxom glanced over at G'narish in surprise and gratitude. Jaxom had expected G'narish, as the last of the old-timer Weyrleaders, to be more resistant to his proposal. Jaxom nodded to G'narish. "Thank you Weyrleader."

Masterharper Sebell stood. "I suggest we put Lord Jaxom's suggestion to a vote."

Though Lord Toric and Lord Bargen both protested loudly, Jaxom's proposal carried. The room then broke into three groups as each haggled over who would be their representatives. Jaxom sat off to one side with Sharra smiling to himself. He had accomplished what he wanted. Now it was up to the individual groups to choose their representatives, but Jaxom had a pretty good idea who those chosen would most likely be.

Despite the problems that they presented and the odd reactions of the fire-lizards to Hypatia, Jaxom liked both of them and did not want any harm to come to them. He was sure that there had to be a peaceful way to deal with the situation that would be satisfactory to all.

After a little over an hour the selections had been made. The dragonriders had chosen F'lar and K'van. Jaxom had expected it to be F'lar and N'ton but K'van was just as good a choice. The craftmasters had chosen Masterharper Sebell and Mastersmith Fandarel which was exactly what Jaxom had expected. The Lord Holders had chosen Lord Groghe and Lord Jaxom. Though Jaxom was hoping to be included he had not been too sure that he would be selected. Lord Toric had lobbied heavily to be included but none of the other lord holders trusted him.

After a reminder that threadfall was expected tomorrow the meeting was called to a close. While those not directly involved were returned to their homes those in the committee met in Jaxom's study to discuss how to handle their meeting with the two visitors.

Jaxom waved his hand negligently at the room in general. "Everyone get comfortable." He flopped down into the chair behind his desk. "The first question is what do we, the people of Pern, really want?" He placed his elbows on the desk. "Do we really want to maintain our isolation or do we want to initiate contact with those that sent Alex and Tia?"

Master Sebell was the first to respond. "I would say that the general consensus is overwhelmingly for maintaining our current isolation." He paused glancing at F'lar and Lessa. "Although the commerce possibilities are very intriguing, and I personally would like to see such contact initiated, it seems to me, however, that in this case we should attempt to follow the will of the majority."

Menolly jumped in at this point. "Even so, it might be a good idea to see if they can leave us a way to contact the outside world should we ever decide to end our isolation."

F'lar spoke. "I agree with both suggestions. We are better off on our own but we shouldn't cut ourselves off completely just in case we one day change our minds."

Jaxom nodded. "That makes sense to me. Is everyone agreed?" At everyone's verbal assent he continued. "The next question is how should we handle this meeting with the visitors?"

K'van responded. "We could have it here in your study Lord Jaxom."

Lord Groghe spoke up. "Wherever we have it we should try to make it as friendly and informal as possible. Maybe in your main hall during a friendly lunch."

Lady Sharra decided to chime in. "There is also that third person inside the ship to consider. Maybe we could hold it in their spaceship in order to include her in the discussion as well."

Menolly spoke up. "Jaxom, maybe you can feel them out. Get an idea how they feel about it before we meet with them. We could get back together tomorrow after threadfall and make a decision then."

Jaxom looked around at the group then spoke. "If that is acceptable to the rest of you then Sharra and I will try to feel them out this afternoon and we will meet again tomorrow immediately after threadfall to decide how we, as a group, should approach them."

~ o ~

Brand was thoroughly engrossed in the view below as Alex brought the grav-sled into a wide sweep over the cultivated fields just south-east of Ruatha Hold. Alex took the opportunity to comment quietly to Tia. "I sure wish I knew what was happening in that gathering back at the hold. I'm sure that we are the main topic of discussion."

Tia responded over the comlink. "Just before we parted I slipped a comlink button into Lord Jaxom's pocket. The meeting is being recorded."

**____****Continued in Part 6**

___( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and_'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	6. Contact and Discoveries

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

_**Author's Note: **Sorry for the long delay on this chapter. Life and work have conspired to come between me and my writing. Originally this was to be the last chapter but I decided that the last three chapters just didn't work so I made a lot of revisions, especially on this chapter which has gone in a radically different direction (even the title of this chapter has changed). Now the story no longer ends in this chapter and I have no idea where it will go from here. I hope the next chapters won't take so long.______  
_

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**Chapter** **6 : Contact and Discoveries**

As lunchtime approached Alex turned the grav-sled back toward the main hold proper. By the time they had arrived all but five of the dragons had departed. Two of the largest golden dragons and two of the great bronze colored dragons remained as well as the little white dragon.

Alex circled the cliff top once giving Tia's ship and the five remaining dragons the once over. He noticed that the way the dragons were arranged suggested a distinct pairing between the two golden dragons and the bronze dragons. He wondered if they were 'mated' pairs. Did their colors indicate gender?

Tia noticed that the white dragon was still showing an unusual amount of interest in her ship. The larger of the two golden dragons also seemed to be paying an unusual amount of attention to the ship. She nodded toward the dragons and sent a message to Alex over his private comlink. "Alex I'm not sure I like the way they are showing so much interest in my ship."

Alex nodded his understanding of Tia's message then swooped down toward the hold courtyard so fast that it drew a startled yelp from their other passenger, Brand. Alex swung the grav-sled around just above the ground and then set it down smartly right where they had started.

Brand gave a nervous laugh. "Wow, that was quite a ride." As he stood up on slightly shaky legs.

"Show-off." Tia remarked over the private comlink.

Alex responded with a big grin and a wink for Tia.

They exited the grav-sled and after a pause to let Brand regain his stability, headed over to the main hold entrance. The three of them entered the hold to find lunch preparations well underway. Over at one corner table sat a knot of people in deep conversation. Lord Jaxom looked up and waved the three returning tourists over to join the rest of the group.

There turned out to be a half dozen of the tiny fire-lizards scattered among the assembled group and every one of them became agitated as Alex and Tia approached. The people that appeared to be associated with the little creatures were also looking at her a little strangely.

Sharra reached over and petted one of the fire-lizards perched on the table beside her and it calmed down but it continued to stare rather balefully at Tia. One of the other females that they didn't know seemed to focus her attention on on group of fire-lizards and they also quieted down. Sharra turned her attention to the approaching trio and spoke up. "How was your little tour of Ruatha?"

"It was very interesting and enjoyable." Tia responded to Lady Sharra's question. She tried to ignore the reactions of the tiny mini-dragons but their constantly negative reaction to her presence was starting to annoy and worry her. Why were they acting that way?

Brand was a bit more enthusiastic in his response. "It was incredible, almost like riding dragon-back."

Jaxom jumped back in speaking toward Alex and Tia. "Have a seat; I would like you to meet some of my friends."

Brand excused himself, stating that he had hold business to attend to, and left the room. Alex and Tia took the indicated seats and looked curiously at the rest of the people at the table.

Lord Jaxom spoke to the rest of the small group. "These two are the visitors to our planet that I was telling you about." He pointed to Alex. "This is Alexander." Then he pointed to Tia. "And this is Hypatia." He smiled reassuringly at the two visitors. "They tell me that they prefer to go by the names Alex and Tia."

Several in the group acknowledged the introduction or expressed words of welcome. Then Jaxom began pointing out the others in the group, naming each of them in turn. "May I introduce Bendon Weyrleaders F'Lar and Lessa . . . Southern Weyrleaders K'van and Adrea . . . Lord Holder Groghe of Fort Hold . . . Lord Holder Larad and Lady Dulsay of Telgar Hold . . . Master Harpers Sebell and Menolly and finally Master Smith Fandarel."

Alex and Tia both acknowledged each person as they were introduced. Though not part of the committee chosen to confront Alex and Tia, Lord Larad and Lady Dulsay had both elected to remain at Ruatha because she had expressed a strong interest in meeting the two visitors from space.

For the next half hour Alex and Tia were filled in on the rank and function of each member of the group. It quickly became apparent that these were all very important and influential leaders on Pern. With the exception of the agitation of the little fire-lizards, it was a very pleasant gathering.

They were discussing the function of the harpers in dissemination of knowledge and news when Tia suddenly stiffened. Everyone at the table became aware of Tia at the same time. The look on her face and the attitude of her body spoke strongly of surprise and uncertainty. She looked at Alex. "It's happening again."

"The voices?" Alex inquired.

Tia nodded her head, a look of uncertainty and a hint of fear in her eyes. The faint voices were not coming in from any external source. Whatever they were, they were only in her own mind.

Alex nodded. "Tia, relax. Just concentrate on the voices. Try to hear what they're saying."

As everyone looked on in concern or curiosity, Tia tried to follow his instructions as best as she could. She relaxed and tried to clear her mind of the worry and uncertainty that had been plaguing her since the first time it had happened and thought only about the faint voice, trying to listen to it. Tia took a deep calming breath. Though it was only her avatar drawing air into a small chamber that allowed normal speech, the action had the desired effect on her personal equilibrium.

Suddenly a voice came through in startling crystal clarity. '_Do you hear me? I am Ruth. Can you hear me?_'

She tried to think back at the source of the voice in her head. '_I can hear you. I'm Hypatia. Where are you?_'

The voice responded. '_I am right outside your spaceship._'

The closest living thing to her ship was the little white dragon, so she asked. '_Are you the white dragon that is sitting right next to me?_'

The mental voice replied. '_Yes._'

Tia looked over at Alex in surprise. "It's the white dragon. The voice I have been hearing in my head is Lord Jaxom's white dragon. He told me his name is Ruth."

At that moment a second voice entered her mind. '_I am Ramoth. Can you hear me?_'

Tia's eyebrows shot up in surprise. "Now I'm hearing a second voice that calls itself Ramoth." She then thought her response. '_Yes, I hear you Ramoth. Who are you?_'

The first voice responded. '_Ramoth is the greatest golden one. She is the queen. Lessa is her rider._'

Tia looked over at Lessa. "Ruth tells me that Ramoth is the golden dragon." She glanced around at the others in surprise. "The dragons are telepathic and they are intelligent."

Lessa responded. "Yes they are, but dragons very rarely talk to anyone other than their rider."

Ruth's voice returned filled with confusion. '_But why is the dead one in the hall speaking for you?_"

By now everyone else was looking at Tia in surprised amazement. Lessa was the first to speak. "Ramoth and Ruth are both talking to the person left back on your ship. How is it that you can hear them?"

Tia glanced over at Alex in consternation. She had not wanted them to find out the truth about her just yet but the dragons seemed to have forced the issue.

Again the voice of Ruth invaded her mind. '_Do not be afraid. We will not harm you._'

Tia sent a question to Alex over his comlink. "How should I answer them, Alex?"

Alex shrugged back as he spoke aloud. "It's your call, Love." He smiled to let her know that he would back whatever she decided to tell them.

Tia glanced upward in the general direction of where she knew the dragons to be located. Then she scanned the curious faces of those around her and finally she looked at Alex who smiled back at her as he took her hand and squeezed it gently.

Tia took another deep, though unnecessary, cleansing breath then she began to speak while holding out her hands indicating her synthetic body. "What you are looking at is a simulacrum . . . a synthetic mechanical avatar. What is left of my real body is sealed inside a titanium shell mounted in the core of my ship." She glanced around at her confused audience. "I am, what is normally referred to as, a shell person. There are very restrictive requirements to become what I am. A shell person must have a fully functional brain and a normally high intelligence but their body must be, for whatever reason, incapable of sustaining any kind of normal life." Again she glanced around at the array of emotions on the faces of her audience.

While Tia was speaking to the people around her synthetic body she was also becoming more attuned to the mental voices and thoughts of the dragons beside her.

She continued her explination. "I started out as a normal healthy child. When I was eight years old I was with my parents on an archeological dig on some nameless dead planet. I contracted a disease that attacked my nervous system. By the time the doctors had killed the disease inside me my nervous system had been almost completely destroyed. My brain was untouched but my body required massive artificial help to stay alive and I had lost all sense of feeling and control over my own body."

She now saw shock and sorrow on the faces of her audience. She could also feel deep sympathy coming to her from the minds of the dragons perched near her ship. She was also beginning to get a sense of the strong bond that existed between the dragons and their riders. She continued. "That was when they offered me the option of becoming a shell person. I was only eight years old but I understood exactly what it meant to be a shell person and I jumped at the chance to have a useful life again." This next would be the most difficult part to relate. "They treated my useless body so that I wouldn't grow any larger and hooked me up to a series of complex machines that would keep my biological body alive then they sealed the whole thing inside my shell."

She could see hints of horror creeping into on the expressions of her audience. It was time to explain the shell to them. "My shell is a sealed titanium cylinder that contains my biological body and all the machinery necessary to keep me alive. It also has video and audio sensors, an external speaker and motorized wheels mounted on it to let me see, hear, speak and move around when I was first learning to be what I am. There are also hundreds of millions of fine wires that connect my brain to a series of external communication link systems. Once I finished my education my shell was mounted and sealed inside the central column of my ship and my brain was connected to all of the ship's systems. So now I control my ship just like you control your own body."

Master Sebell frowned in confusion as he asked the, expected, next question. "But . . . what about you? " He pointed to her synthetic body. ". . . here."

She nodded. "Inside this mechanical body is a sophisticated communications-link system. I can connect directly to this body just like I connect to my ship. That is how I can interact with you here, even though I am in reality still sealed up inside my ship." As she looked around she could see varying degrees of dawning comprehension on their faces.

In her head she heard Ramoth's voice. '_You are inside the ship but you control the body in the hall._'

Ruth's voice added. '_Then you are both inside the ship and inside the body at the same time?_'

She responded to both voices in her mind. '_That is correct._' Then she responded verbally to those in the hall. "Ruth and Ramoth both understand."

There was a long span of silence as they all absorbed the extremely foreign concept that Tia and the dragons had just revealed to them. Several of them still had shocked expressions on their faces as they found themselves stuck on the idea of her being trapped in a metal shell barely bigger than a coffin.

Finally the silence was broken when K'van's mate, Weyrwoman Adrea, expressed their feelings. "You poor dear , to be trapped inside the walls of that ship. It must be terrible for you."

The new shocked silence from Adrea's words of sympathy was broken by Alex's laugh and Tia's amused response. "Trapped?" She smiled shaking her head as she projected her words mentally to the dragons while speaking to those people around her. "No, the ship **is** my body. I'm no more trapped in my ship then you are trapped inside your body." She waved her hand indicating those around her. "Your dragons have more freedom than you do. They can fly or teleport anywhere they want." She gave a short laugh as she warmed to her subject. "I have the freedom of all of space. When you wish to go somewhere you walk or run or fly on the back of your dragons. I fly through all the vastness of space from star to star and planet to planet at speeds you could barely comprehend as easily as you walk across your hold." She placed her hand on her chest. "And when I wish to walk among you I have this body." She spread out her arms. "When I am in control of this body, it is as real to me as your body is to you."

Alex jumped in at this point. "Most shell people feel sorry for us poor 'normal' people with our feeble bodies and our limited senses. With all the sensors available to her in her ship she can see and hear things that we cannot even imagine. In her shell Tia is nearly invulnerable. The only down side is in relation to her long lifespan."

Tia jumped back in. "Inside my shell I have a potential lifespan of hundreds of years. With the exception of other shell people, I will outlive everyone that I know. My family, my friends . . ." She now looked directly at Alex and they all could see a hint of sorrow cross her face. ". . . those that I love." She looked down at the floor for a moment as she composed herself adjusting the hormone balance inside her shell and regaining her calm equilibrium. As she paused she was transmitting her latest discovery to Alex over his comlink. "Alex, the bond between these dragons and their riders is so strong that I don't think either one could continue to exist without the other." She looked up at those around her. "I love my life. I would no more go back to a 'normal' life than you dragonriders would willingly give up your dragons to live what passes for a 'normal' life here on Pern."

_**Continued in Part 7**_

_( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and _'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	7. Threats of Disaster

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

_**Author's Note: **Now I am entering uncharted territory. From here on I am making this thing up as I go along and have no ide what will happen next. Again sorry for the long delay on this chapter. I'm working on this story as much as I can. ______  
_

* * *

**Chapter** **7 : ****Threats of Disaster**

For the last half hour the small group seated in the corner of Ruatha's main hall had been discussing and mulling over Tia and her very unusual life style as a shell person and brainship. The concept of her physical body being sealed up inside the ship while at the same time appearing to be in the artificial body sitting among them still left a couple of them unsure. The dragons however seemed to have accepted the concept fairly easily. Tia had finally convinced the others in the group that, not only was she OK with her current life, but that she actually loved being what she was.

The subject of conversation had drifted to what it was like for Alex and Tia, spending much of their lives traveling in space from planet to planet and Tia was waxing a bit poetic about it. "It's an amazing life. Every star system, every planet is unique and often totally unlike anything we could have possibly imagined." She glanced around, her eyes almost glazed over with emotion, as she recalled some of the things that she had seen. "I have seen, heard and experienced things that you could not even imagine. Things ranging from the sublimely beautiful, such as the Reticulan mating croons, to the horrifically repulsive and just plain terrifying." She shook her head as a look of wonder suffused her features. "Sometimes we have even encountered the beautiful and the terrifying together at the same time. Like the, eight kilometer wide, Great Magma Falls of Argos Two."

Her eyes seemed to refocus and she glanced around at her audience. "Take Pern, for instance. A beautiful, lush planet completely surrounded by an ort cloud of a deadly ravenous life form that would strip the planet bare of life in the blink of an eye. Yet here you are. You have bonded harmoniously with great fearsome dragons and you treat that deadly ort cloud menace as a minor inconvenience. Meanwhile you have made this planet into what many would consider a beautiful and inviting pastoral paradise and you have no wish to leave it or change it." She looked around at the variety of expressions as they absorbed her unique description of their home.

Into the contemplative quiet, Alex spoke. "What I'm most curious about is how you are able to deal with the spore incursions or, threadfall as you called it?"

F'lar was the one to respond. "That is simple." He glanced over at Lessa and they shared a momentary private smile between them then he looked back at Alex and continued. "The dragons burn it out of the sky."

Tia and Alex looked at each other incredulously then he looked back at F'lar and asked. "But how?"

It was Lessa that responded to Alex. "Whenever threadfall occurs, the dragons and their riders fly up and meet the falling thread high up in the sky. The dragons belch fire, burning the thread to ash long before it can reach the ground."

K'van's chest seemed to swell just a bit in his pride. "We dragonriders and our dragons protect the skies of pern from anything that might harm our home."

Tia blinked as images from classic fantasy stories of fire-breathing dragons flashed through her head. She blinked away the images from her mind and turned her attention to F'lar. "The dragons breathe fire? Amazing! How do they do it?"

F'lar smiled tolerantly at Tia as he responded to, what was to him, her naive question. "The dragons don't **breathe** fire. What they do is chew a certain type of mineral we call firestone and belch the gas that forms in their gut. That gas burns on contact with air creating a jet of flame that is nearly as long as their body. With practice the dragons can maintain a nearly continuous jet of flame while fighting thread."

Alex became thoughtful as he mulled this over then remarked. "It sounds very dangerous. What if you misjudge and come into direct contact with the spores? Those spores would eat you alive."

F'lar responded looking very serious. "It can be dangerous. Thread can completely consume a living body in just a few minutes." Then he smiled. "But fortunately thread cannot survive in the absolute cold of between. If we get any live thread on us our dragons simply pop into between for a couple of seconds and the thread freezes and falls away."

Tia seemed to be thinking very hard about something when she looked over at F'lar. "It seems to me that it would take an impossibly large number of dragons to handle the massive amount of spores that would be involved. How many dragons are there?"

Jaxom responded, apparently calculating in his head. "Fort Weyr has twelve wings, a total of three hundred forty two dragons. That is usually enough to handle a normal threadfall."

K'van added. "If you count all eight Weyrs there are just under two thousand five hundred fighting dragons currently available to protect the skies of Pern from threadfall."

F'lar jumped in at this point. "Even though, based on the last projections from the Dawn Sisters, we are expecting tomorrow's threadfall to be denser than normal, when we meet the thread tomorrow afternoon, there will be more than enough dragons to fight the fall."

Tia's face showed surprise. "That is a lot of dragons." She frowned, apparently deep in thought, then looked back at F'lar, shaking her head. "Even with that many dragons I don't see how you can cover that much territory and I would think that they would be overwhelmed by the sheer density of the spores in the approaching wave."

F'lar looked back at her, the seriousness of his face now matching hers. "What do you mean? What do you know about the coming threadfall?"

Tia responded. "After the first time threadfall was mentioned, I linked my AI's to the AI onboard the Yokohama. I have been correlating historical data on spore incursions and current observations of the approaching ort cloud material. The wave of material . . ."

"Lord Jaxom!" Brand called out as he rushed into the hall. "I was on the computer checking the projections from the Dawn Sisters for tomorrow's threadfall. The timetable and distribution have both changed." He skidded to a stop before the group. "According to the latest report threadfall is supposed to start just after sun-up tomorrow **morning** over Keroom Hold rather than the late afternoon over Ruatha Hold."

All four dragonrider's looked at Brand incredulously as Jaxom exclaimed. "What?"

Lessa responded calmly. "Shifts in the pattern have happened before but I don't remember any of them being this drastic. Could there be a mistake?"

Brand and Tia both answered simultaneously. "No!"

Brand continued breathlessly. "I had the dawn sister rerun the projections to be sure." He paused, his eyes wide with fear, as he took a deep breath. "But that's only part of it. The report said that the fall will be about twice as wide as normal and it will last a bit over six hours instead of four hours and the fall will also be much denser than normal."

The hall was suddenly silent as the shock of Brand's report sunk in. Alex glanced around seeing shock and uncertainty and a hint of fear on the faces of everyone at the table as they all digested this unexpected news. It was apparent to both Alex and Tia that everyone here considered this news to be extremely serious.

Finally Tia spoke. "That was what I was trying to tell you just now. Based on all the most recent data and observations from the Yokohama, it appears that three separate waves of the ort cloud material have managed to coincide forming a larger and denser band than is apparently normal. I did some back tracking and one of the waves seems to have come in from the same direction as a meteor strike I found in the records from five years ago. I couldn't find any back data for the other wave but I suspect that it may have been caused by a gravitational slingshot off the innermost planet."

F'lar spoke up a deeply worried frown on his face. "This is a very serious situation. Bendon will be there to help all we can."

K'van jumped in, looking downright scared. "Serious? It's a potential disaster!" At a glare from F'lar, K'van visibly pulled himself together. "You can count on Southern to do our part in this crisis."

Lessa, who had been gazing off into space the moment before, refocused on the group and added her voice. "I have contacted the other Queens and all the Weyrs are behind you. Tomorrow morning, when threadfall begins, all the Weyrs of Pern will be there to help. The other five Weyrleaders will meet us here this evening to make plans for tomorrow's assault."

Jaxom responded. "All of Pern appreciates your willingness to help . . . but is Tia right? Will even that many dragons be enough to handle a threadfall of that size and scope?"

Lessa responded. "It doesn't matter. Pern needs us and we will answer the call regardless of the danger."

Tia jumped back in. "But, even if the dragons can successfully burn all of the spores out of the sky, how are you going to handle the meteors?"

Everyone else stared in shock at Tia as Lord Groghe exclaimed. "Meteors?!"

Tia responded. "The data from the Yokohama sensor arrays indicate that there are two bands containing thousands of rocky meteors, ranging from one meter up to a hundred meters in size. One band is leading the spores by a couple of kilometers and the other band is buried deep inside the wave of spores. Won't they pose a hazard to the dragons during threadfall?"

After a moment of stunned silence the group broke out into frightened and confusing babble as everyone spoke at once. Then the calm voice of Master Sebell rose above the chaos. "The meteor shields on the dawn sisters!" He looked over at Jaxom. "I remember Jaxom used them once before to sweep out some of the threadfall when we first gained access to the dawn sisters."

Lord Groghe jumped in. "That's right, I remember that." He also looked directly at Jaxom. "Couldn't you do it again to thin out this fall?"

Jaxom closed his eyes and seemed to be concentrating hard for a moment. Ten seconds later two of the little fire-lizards appeared above the table clutching the ends of a meter long tube. They released it, letting it drop to the table. Jaxom unrolled what turned out to be a map of Pern. Sebell, Groghe and Adera grabbed and held down the corners of the map.

Jaxom faced Tia. "Can you show me on this map exactly where the newest threadfall pattern will be?"

Tia seemed to lose focus for a moment as she consulted the data stored in the Yokohama's AI then looked down at the map. She placed her hand on the map covering a wide area about an inch east of Keroom Hold. "The fall will start here." She then swiped her hand across the map. "And pass across this area, ending about here." Her hand was covering the eastern half of Rautha Hold.

K'van's eyes got wide. "That's more than twice the territory normally covered by threadfall."

Jaxom shook his head as he pointed to a spot above a place on the northern edge of the larger southern continent labeled 'Landing'. "The Yokohama is in geosynchronous orbit here. The thread won't be coming anywhere near the Yokohama's position."

Tia broke in to their discussion. "I may be able to help out." She then mentally warned the dragons on the fire heights to move back away from her ship because she would be lifting off in a few minutes. After that Tia's eyes seemed to go dead as her face became totally expressionless.

Lord Groghe looked at Tia with a worried frown. "What's happened to her?"

Tia's head swiveled to face Lord Groghe though her dead expression didn't change as it responded. "This body is under AI-3 control."

Alex explained. "Tia is powering up for lift off. She can't run her ship and this body at the same time. She has turned control of the body over to one of her three A.I. computers while she runs the ship. She can still hear us and speak to us through the A.I. link but that is all. Otherwise, the A.I. will respond to direct commands from me or Tia where control of the body is concerned."

Everyone stared at the eerily lifeless yet still mobile body for several seconds then jumped when it announced in a mechanical voice. "Lift-off in fifteen seconds."

Up on the fire heights the dragons had all obediently moved quickly away from the ship. Then after a short interval for all of the ship's systems to come up to power, Tia lifted from the ground and accelerated rapidly straight up, heading for space. Meanwhile below in the hall Tia's artificial body began explaining in a very slightly less mechanical voice. "After you mentioned the meteor shield on the orbiting transport ship I got an idea. I could use my own meteor shield to sweep out the two bands of meteors. My shield is only intended to protect myself but if I run it a maximum power I should be able to at least clear out the meteors. However it will take me about thirteen hours to clear out all the meteors so I will be cutting it very close."

Jaxom breathed a sigh of relief. "That will eliminate the meteor threat, for which we thank-you in advanced." He faced the other dragon riders. "Now all we need is to deal with the unusual density of the threadfall."

F'lar frowned as he spoke. "If the fall is as dense as Tia and the Dawn Sister's computer reported, it will be coming down in heavy sheets. The casualty rate among the dragons and their riders could be unusually high and a lot of thread could get past us and reach the ground. Even with heavy ground crew coverage the damage could be substantial."

Tia's head swiveled to face F'lar. "I may be able to help a little there as well." Everyone's attention centered on her body as it continued to explain in the AI controlled voice. "During actual threadfall I can set my shield for maximum range and dispersion. I can skim the leading edge of the fall just above the planet's atmosphere. At best I will be able to sweep out about ten to fifteen percent of the spores before they hit the atmosphere and hopefully break it up a bit so that the rest will tend to clump more. It's not much but it may be of some help."

F'lar thought a moment then smiled at Tia's emotionless face. "That will be an enormous help. You could very well be the difference between massive devastation and saving our land. It could also save the lives of dozens of dragons and their riders."

Alex replied with a shrug. "We are happy to help in any way that we can."

_**Continued in Part 8**_

_( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and _'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	8. Preparations and Logistics

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

**Chapter** **8 : ********Preparations and Logistics**

Tia had been out in space trying to clear away the leading band of meteors for just over an hour. Her synthetic body meanwhile had been sitting completely motionless in the great hall, only showing signs of life when someone spoke directly to it. Because of the distance involved it took nearly twenty seconds for the body to respond to any direct comment or question and those responses were strictly verbal and exhibited no evidence of human emotion. All though the body was motionless for the most part the head would occasionally swivel toward any sound that seemed to catch its attention.

Most of the hold staff found Tia's nearly lifeless body very disconcerting, especially when it would unexpectedly move. Finally Alex spoke to the body "Tia . . . System Command . . . Follow me." Tia's body immediately stood up and followed Alex up to his and Tia's guestroom.

When Alex returned to the hall Jaxom was looking at him a bit strangely. "What was all that about just now?"

Alex replied. "Tia's body has a very rudimentary AI in it that allows it to follow very simple orders or instructions. So I took it up to our room to get it out of the way."

Jaxom's expression showed hints of disgust. "Are you telling me that you can force her to do whatever you tell her to do?"

Alex shook his head with a bit of a chuckle. "Not hardly. When the body is under her direct control, the AI acts to assist her in operating her body more smoothly and facilitates communication with her ship. It is totally under her control. The only reason it would respond to my instructions just now is because she is not currently in control of it. Tia had the voice command function added in order to make it easier for me to deal with her inert body on those occasions when she has to relinquish control at an inconvenient time. Whenever I use that function the AI sends a message to her relaying the command so that she will be aware of what is being done and she can override any voice command that I give it.

"Oh . . ." Jaxom looked like he just barely understood what Alex had told him.

"I very rarely use that function but I thought it might be better to get her synthetic body out of sight." Alex continued. "If you think it won't unduly upset everyone, I will probably bring it back down for any planning meetings so that Tia will know what is going on and be better able to coordinate her efforts during threadfall."

Jaxom nodded. "That makes sense . . . I think." He seemed to be deep in thought for a moment then he looked up at Alex. "Earlier you were referring to her as a person." He frowned. "Now you are referring to her as 'it'."

Alex nodded, understanding Jaxom's confusion. "When Tia is in control of that body then it is her, just as right now your body is you." He paused cocking his head. "When Tia is not in control then the body is merely an extremely sophisticated mechanical robot with a rudimentary AI brain that can only follow very simple instructions."

Jaxom nodded. "I think I understand but it is difficult to assimilate the concepts involved."

~ o ~

A few hours later all of the other Weyr leaders as well as the Lord holders that were located along the path of tomorrow's threadfall began to arrive at Ruatha Hold by dragonback. Ten minutes earlier Alex had brought Tia's synthetic body back down and it was currently sitting quietly in the far corner of the hall.

As each new guest arrived they were directed into the great hall where there was food and beverage available and they were introduced to Alex. Some of them noticed Tia's body but, except for a few curious glances, ignored it. They assumed that it was some anonymous servant and were far more interested in speaking to Alex.

Once everyone had arrived, they were all quickly apprised of the full scope of the altered threadfall situation. Most of them had already been told of the shift in timing and area for the fall but that was all. The announcement that this fall was several times denser than normal and being accompanied by a swarm of meteors, resulted in pandemonium as questions and complaints and condemnations flew freely through the group.

After several seconds of this a surprisingly powerful bellow from Master Fandarel brought the group to order and quieted them down. Into the resulting silence F'lar spoke, telling them of Tia's part in helping to deal with this unusual crisis.

Lord Laird called out. Do we have any idea whether this Tia person is having any success getting rid of the meteors?"

Alex responded. "No problem, all we have to do is ask her." Most of those in the room looked at Alex in total confusion as he strolled over to Tia's avatar sitting in the corner. "Tia, can you give us a report on your progress with the meteors in the spore cloud?" The avatar's head turned to look at him but it remained silent as those in the hall became more restless and unsure.

About ten seconds later nearly everybody in the room jumped when the avatar suddenly spoke. "Alex, I have managed to clear out nearly a third of the first wave of meteors. It is a slow going tedious job but, though it will be very close, I believed that I should be able to sweep out all of the meteors before this band of spores reaches Pern."

Alex faced the people gathered in the hall. "There is your answer. She is having success sweeping out the meteors but it will take her all night to finish the job."

Now that they were paying attention to Tia's lifeless yet animated synthetic body there were a lot of questions about who and what she was and what was going on. Alex answered their questions as best as he could with occasional help from Lessa and Jaxom.

Though only about a quarter of those present achieved any understanding of the situation with Tia, eventually they ran out of questions and the discussion finally turned back to planning the logistics for tomorrows threadfall.

Ten minutes later the hold servants began serving a light dinner to all the guests. Conversation shifted mostly to other subjects though some of the holders continued discussing the unusual shift in the threadfall pattern. Tia and her strange relationship to the spaceship and the synthetic body sitting in the corner again came up with some rather wild speculation about what it meant.

Alex tried to answer any inquiries from others about it. It quickly became apparent that some people got it and some people had no clue. Despite his every effort to explain Tia's situation, it quickly became apparent to Alex that those without a clue continued to be without a clue no matter what he said. Eventually he gave up trying to explain to those that couldn't understand and he resorted to simplistic doubletalk. Those that did understand caught on to what he was doing and were amused by the whole thing.

Once the dinner was over and the remains collected they went back to discussing the situation and making plans for how to handle all the logistics of such a massive operation.

Whenever Alex heard an unfamiliar term or didn't understand some reference, Jaxom or Lessa would quietly explain it to him. Alex found the whole thing fascinating. After a while he noticed servants stacking a large number of cylindrical assemblies against the wall next to the main entrance and asked about them.

Jaxom answered. "Those are Agenothree flamethrowers for the ground crews and the queen's wing."

Alex looked at Jaxom curiously. "Queens wing? I thought all the dragons belched fire."

Lessa jumped in. "They do but chewing the firestone to create that fire makes the female dragons sterile. If we were to let the queen dragons chew firestone, there would be no hatchlings and the dragons would all die out in one generation." She paused as her words sank in. "So the queen riders carry those flame throwers and fly below the other dragons, catching any thread that gets past them."

Her explanation got Alex to thinking. He had wanted to help but didn't know how. Now he had an idea. "I could use one of those flamethrowers on my grav-sled. If I could just get to where the other dragons are, I could fly the grav-sled just below the Queen's wing and help in catching any clumps that might get past them. With the high density of this fall every little bit will help. I heard someone talking about how Lord Jaxom does that when they have threadfall over Ruatha. I figure that if Lord Jaxom and myself, both flew low cover on this threadfall then, between the two of us, we can double the amount that we can catch and probably cut the amount that might get to the ground down to nearly nothing."

F'lar and Jaxom both nodded their heads an appreciation as Jaxom spoke. "You and Tia are already doing so much to help us in this crisis that we could never thank you enough and your assistance in this would also be greatly appreciated."

Alex nodded back. "I am glad to help." He glanced down at the map of Pern on the table and thought for a moment then spoke again. "I'd better get the sled loaded. I'll have to leave right away if I want to get to Keroom Hold by morning."

Lessa placed her hand on his arm as he turned away, stopping Alex. "There is no need to rush. Ramoth can carry you and your vehicle to Keroom tomorrow morning."

Alex looked at Lessa doubtfully. "Your dragon can carry that much mass?"

Lessa grinned. "Ramoth can carry as much as she thinks she can carry."

Alex stared at her momentarily then blinked. "Hu?"

Lessa laughed at the look on his face. "Just take my word for it. We have found that the dragons can transport as much mass as they believe that they can carry and Ramoth just told me that she can carry your flying craft with no problems."

Alex tilted his head at her skeptically. "If you say so then I'll take your word for it."

Sebell, who had been listening quietly nearby, now spoke up. "Those flamethrower tanks are only good for a bit over thirty minutes of continuous use. You won't be able to jump back here for refills, so if you plan to ride out the entire fall, you will need to take enough tanks to last as well as a few spare spray wands incase one gets clogged or damaged."

Lessa stood up. "That's a very good point. We should see how many tanks we can put into that flying machine of yours."

Jaxom also stood up. "I agree." Signaling for Brand and two servants to follow, he led them out to the grav-sled in the courtyard, picking up a tank on his way out. The other's followed his lead.

After some serious study they figured that the grav-sled could hold up to fifty tanks and over a dozen spray wands in the back storage compartment plus another half dozen tanks could be stowed in the passenger compartment. It was decided that this way the grav-sled could act as a mobile depot for the queen's wing so that they wouldn't have to send dragons back and forth to the Weyrs when the queen riders' tanks ran out. Brand would go along to handle the job of collecting empty tanks and passing out full ones while in mid-air. Alex was a bit dubious but Brand assured him that mid-air transfers of those Agenothree tanks were very common and he could handle it.

~ DRnBS ~

Though sunrise was still an hour away, the light of the local sun was just beginning to make the highest clouds glow as everyone rushed to prepare for threadfall. Alex looked up in amazement as over two thousand flying dragons appeared above him and took up their positions in the airborne formations. Alex breathed a deep sigh. "Oh, Tia, I wish you could see this. It is amazing."

Tia's voice startled him making him jump. "I am seeing this. And it's incredible."

Alex swung around to see Tia climbing into the grav-sled. "Tia, where are you?" He looked around trying to see her ship.

Tia responded. "I'm currently just beyond the atmosphere following the leading edge of the spore cloud. I began my first thinning run about twenty minutes ago and will be making my turnaround in a matter of seconds."

Alex looked confused. "But how are you controlling your body from that far away?"

"I'm not." She replied. "The body's AI is controlling it. I merely rerouted audio and video through the long range comlink channel. That way I can see and hear what's going on and give verbal commands to the AI."

Alex looked a bit closer and saw the blank dead features in her face and less graceful movements that were always a telltale giveaway that Tia was not '_in_' her synthetic body. "Oh . . . I see." He responded. "But why?"

Tia's amused chuckle came from the avatar. "So that I can see and record the whole experience for posterity." She replied. "The leading edge of the spores will be hitting the upper atmosphere any minute now. You need to get going." The body sat in the seat behind Alex and fastened the restraint harness. At that moment Brand climbed into the sled looking curiously at Tia. He shrugged and settled into one of the remaining empty seats. By now he had become accustomed to the strange presence of the avatar. Brand was one of the few that seemed able to really understand the relationship between Tia, her ship and her synthetic body.

~ o ~

Far above the surface Tia was turning for her next pass at the deadly cloud of spores falling toward the planet. By setting her meteor shield at maximum range and dispersion Tia was able to sweep out a huge area of the spore cloud with each pass. However the wide dispersion spread the power of the field very thinly. Tia figured that she was getting only ten to twenty percent of the spores in the swept area. She only hoped it would be enough.

Through the ships scanners she saw the thinned out leading edge of the spores hitting the upper atmosphere. At the same time she was watching Alex in the grav-sled through the eyes of her avatar. She saw the claws of the huge golden dragon close on the sides of the sled then all transmissions from her avatar ceased. Tia felt the beginnings of panic as she scanned the electromagnetic spectrum searching for any sign of Alex and her synthetic body.

_**Continued in Part 9**_

_( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and _'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	9. Threadfall

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

**Chapter** **9 : ************Threadfall**

Tia was in a state of almost pure panic. All transmissions from her synthetic body had cut off without any warning and there was also no signal coming from Alex's comlink implant. Even the grav-sled's telemetry signals had stopped. What had happened to Alex and the grav-sled? Where had he gone? She tried to make contact with Ramoth telepathically and couldn't get through to her either. Now she was really beginning to freak out.

~ o ~

Alex glanced up to see Ramoth hovering about a fifty meters above him and Lessa was waving at him in an indication that he should hurry up. After glancing back to make sure that everyone and everything was secure Alex activated the sleds drive and rose up from the ground.

Suddenly Ramoth grabbed the sled and the next instant Alex was immersed in total darkness and a cold that seemed to reach all the way to his bones. He could feel the panic rising within him then, remembering Lessa'a instructions from last night, began counting seconds. Two seconds later reality reasserted itself as the world returned. Alex heard someone cry out "There it is!" Then Ramoth released her hold on the sled and quickly climbed up, swinging into position among the golden dragons flying two hundred meters above.

Alex had to scramble to grab the controls and recover control of the grav-sled then he looked around spotting Jaxom on white Ruth about a hundred meters off to his right. Jaxom pointed upward and nearly straight ahead. Alex looked in the indicated direction and saw a grey haze begin forming high up in the sky. Moving across the band of gray was a fan shaped area that seemed to be sparkling in a myriad of iridescent colors. The gray haze behind the moving iridescent fan was noticeably lighter. Tia's idea was definitely working. Alex just hoped that it would be enough.

~ o ~

Just as Tia thought she was going to lose her sanity the transmissions from her synthetic body resumed only now they were coming from almost directly below her just as wave after wave of dragons popped into existence in the lower atmosphere. The telemetric signals from the grav-sled and Alex's comlink signal had also resumed, indicating that all grav-sled systems were normal and Alex was back.

Looking through her avatar's eyes Tia saw the golden dragon quickly climbing away from the grav-sled as Alex scrambled to regain control. Tia instantly felt a wave of relief sweep through her at the sight of Alex, apparently unharmed sitting in front of her avatar. After she had regained her cool, Tia began transmitting a quick series of verbal commands to her avatar's onboard AI then returned the majority of her attention to her current task. If she could have sighed with relief, she would have.

~ o ~

Alex glanced up as, with a deafening roar, the dragons began to rise toward the fast approaching wall of falling spores. Alex shifted the sled over toward the left end of the formation of golden dragons as Jaxom and Ruth shifted toward the right end of the formation. He reached back to grab the flamethrower wand only to find that Tia's avatar had already grabbed it.

After a second, he realized that Tia intended to have her body's AI wield the flamethrower while he concentrated on flying the sled. Alex returned all his attention to the job of maneuvering the grav-sled. Brand also grabbed up one of the flamethrowers and prepared to use it.

High up, ahead of them, the upper ranks of dragons came into contact with the leading edge of the falling spores and hundreds of plumes of bright dragon-fire blossomed in the sky. Alex let his jaw drop as he stared at the amazing sight of flaming dragons battling Pern's old familiar airborne menace.

Soon the lower ranks of dragons joined in the battle then the golden dragons entered the fray, the women aboard their queen dragons flashing long streamers of fire from their flamethrowers to burn the spores that got through the squadrons of dragons above them.

At this point Alex realized that the spores were falling in tangled clumps rather than in continuous sheets like he had been expecting. He realized that it fortunately made the spores much easier for the dragons to deal with.

Alex marveled at the sight for a few seconds then spotted a tangled clump of squirming sickly gray thick threads falling past the golden dragons above. Belatedly, he dived the sled toward the sickening sight. Suddenly a long thin stream of flame shot out past his right shoulder and intersected the falling clump of spores quickly turning it to black ash. Alex was surprised at how fast the spores burned. They were apparently very flammable.

As he flashed past the now harmless cloud of ash, Alex spotted the white dragon rocking his wings off to the left. Alex glanced over and saw that Jaxom was grinning and giving him the thumbs up sign. The next instant Jaxom turned serious as the white dragon dove on another errant gray clump, belching a great gout of flame that instantly incinerated the large clump leaving a cloud of ash that scattered as the white dragon passed through it.

Seconds later Alex spotted two more clumps close together and dived directly between them. While Tia's avatar incinerated the clump on the right, Brand destroyed the clump on the left. Alex grinned. "Two at once!"

~ o ~

From her vantage point high above the atmosphere Tia could see definite variations in the density and movement of the clumps of spores. Realizing that she could clearly sense the dragons below and speak to them telepathically, Tia began sending her observations of the threadfall patterns to the various weyrleader's dragons.

Soon she noticed a shifting of the groupings of dragons far below her. The dragon squadrons were shifting flight patterns in order to more effectively intercept falling spores.

~ o ~

Ten minutes into the fall Alex heard a dragon bellow and caught a glimpse of a dragon with the last foot of its wingtip incased in a glob of writhing thread. The next instant the dragon had vanished. Moments later the dragon reappeared. The tangle of spores had turned black and quickly flaked off. The dragon's wingtip had turned an ugly red and black color but the dragon continued to fly. The dragon's rider however showed pain and sorrow on his face.

Seconds later the rider's face hardened as the injured dragon swerved to attack another tangle of spores that fell near them. Twice more in the next few minutes Alex observed a dragon bellow and blink out only to quickly return sporting some apparently minor damage from a too close encounter with the deadly spores.

Alex was pulling back into his position when he heard a woman scream and a dragon bellow almost directly above him. He glanced up to see a horrifying sight. A large tangle of the gray writhing spores covered part of the golden dragon's upper left shoulder and part of the left side of her rider. The image lasted less than a second then the dragon and her rider vanished.

When that queen dragon and rider did not reappear Alex got worried. He knew that Tia was somehow in telepathic contact with the dragons and after several seconds he called out to the avatar behind him. "Tia, what happened to that queen that just disappeared?"

It was several long seconds before Tia responded through the avatar. "The dragon made it back to her Weyr but she is very badly wounded and her rider is in even worse shape and unconscious."

"Will they be OK?" Alex asked worriedly.

"I don't know, but the other dragons are very upset by this. The Queens are very rarely hurt when fighting threadfall but the amount of thread that is getting through my sweeps is still a lot denser than usual and more than usual is getting through to the queens. This is the second queen dragon that has been so badly injured that she had to return to her weyr."

After a short pause, Tia continued. "From the other dragons I have learned that they are, so far, managing to prevent the thread from getting through to the ground but the injury rate is higher than normal."

~ o ~

About forty minutes into the fall Alex was startled by a sudden shadow that covered his grav-sled. He looked up expecting to see a large clump of spores barreling down on them only to see instead one of the golden queen dragons flying two and a half meters above him.

A second later the woman aboard the dragon dropped a flamethrower tank which Brand deftly caught. While he was stowing the apparently empty tank and pulling out a fresh tank, the golden dragon banked and slid sideways then dropped below the sled and slid back underneath them. The dragon was flying so close that the woman's head was just to the left of and almost even with the bottom of the sled.

Brand held the full tank over the side of the sled and as far down as he could reach. The woman reached up and grabbed the tank then the massive golden dragon dropped rapidly away from the sled. A second later the golden queen was rising as the woman was sliding the tank into a harness on the dragon's neck behind her. Then she attached the spraying wand. The whole maneuver had taken only about twelve seconds to accomplish.

As the golden dragon was merging back into the squadron of other golden queens, Alex spotted another clump that had gotten through and dived on it. A second later Brand had burned it out of the sky.

As Alex swung back around he caught a glimpse of the avatar swapping out its tank. The next second he was again diving in on three close together clumps. Brand and the avatar quickly incinerated two of the clumps. Then, as Alex continued the dive, Brand burned the third clump to ash. Alex then had to execute a brutal high-G pull-up to avoid hitting the ground. He heard Brand grunt against the force but heard no other complaint.

~ o ~

It was over two hours into the threadfall and Alex had slipped into a pattern of scan the sky, dive on stray clumps, burn said clumps and return to his position. The occasional arrival of a queen rider to switch out flamethrower tanks interrupted the numbing pattern. Alex could feel hints of weariness beginning to creep up on him when he spotted an unusually large clump falling far to his right. He was about to turn away, thinking Jaxom would get it, when he realized that Jaxom was already diving on another clump even further away.

Alex swung the grav-sled around in a generator straining tight turn and dived but he immediately realized that he would not be able to get to it before it hit the ground. Well that was what the ground crews were for. Alex looked for and spotted the nearest ground crew and realized that, because of the rough terrain, it would take them far too long to reach the spot where the spores were falling. At the rate that the spores were supposed to be able to spread, the infestation would be too big for that small group to control by the time they got to it.

Alex continued his dive and arrived at the spot just seconds after the spores hit the ground. The infestation was already growing rapidly. Alex thought fast then set the sled into hover mode directly over where the spores had landed. He fired the sled's auxiliary lift thrusters at full power. Alex had managed to hold the sled in position for nearly a second and a half, burning out all the spores that were already starting to spread, before it shot upward under the force of the thrusters. Satisfied that he had averted this little disaster Alex allowed the sled to shoot back up under the auxiliary thrusters and quickly returned to his position below the golden dragons.

Alex glanced up and spotted the iridescent fan that marked Tia's position just above the planet's atmosphere. The obvious difference in the darkness of the spore cloud in front of and behind the iridescent fan was mute testimony that she was having a decisive effect on the density of this threadfall.

Alex thought that if this threadfall was this bad, despite how much she was thinning it out, then it would have been a total disaster without her help. Then he spotted a couple of clumps of thread falling past the queens and swerved to intercept them. Seconds later, as he swung around and dived after another large falling tangle of thread, Alex found himself wondering if he was going to be able to last for the entire fall. The effort of controlling the grav-sled through all of the constant aerobatics required to chase down thread was exhausting.

~ o ~

Several hours later an exhausted Alex spotted the cliff face and courtyard of Ruatha Hold below him. Ten minutes later he noticed the dragons above him breaking off and disappearing. Then he realized that the gray haze of falling spores was gone. He glanced over at Jaxom and Ruth and saw Jaxom giving the all clear sign and a tired, but still fairly enthusiastic, thumbs-up sign. Then Ruth and Jaxom blinked out of sight. Weary to the bone, Alex swung the grav-sled around and headed back toward Ruatha Hold.

As he got within range of the hold Alex saw Tia, already sitting on the ground of Ruatha's fire heights. White Ruth was laid out on the ground right next to Tia's ship. A second later two bronze dragons and a golden dragon landed in the courtyard. The riders clumsily dismounted from their beasts and were met by Jaxom and Sharra who had been waiting at the hold's main doors.

Alex set the sled down in its usual place in the courtyard seconds after the bronze and the golden dragons lifted off from the ground. Alex shut down the sled's generator and glanced up to see the three dragons disappear onto the fire heights next to Tia and the little white dragon. He could see signs of fatigue in every movement of the three huge dragons. He looked back at the five people near the hold doors and could see that the three riders were G'narish, F'lar and Lessa. They too showed clear signs of fatigue in their movements.

Alex and Brand half stumbled and half fell out of the sled. Alex felt like his legs were made of rubber and he wasn't sure if they were going to be able to support him for very long. Then Alex glanced back at Tia's body. He saw that the life had returned to her eyes as she climbed gracefully out of the sled.

Tia quickly moved up next to Alex and Brand then put an arm around each of them, half supporting them both as they joined the other five near the main doors. Alex and Brand were both grateful for the unobtrusive help.

They were all distracted as two more pairs of bronze and golden dragons appeared above them. In rapid succession the dragons dropped off their riders in the courtyard then joined the other dragons on the fire heights. Eleven very tired people made their weary way into the hold, accompanied by one very un-tired synthetic person. They were met by the same group of influential Perneese that had been staying at the hold for the last two days and escorted over to one of the tables where they sat down and were served drink and food.

_**Continued in Part 10**_

_( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and _'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	10. Aftermath

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

**Chapter** **10 : ************Aftermath**

As all of those present settled around the tables Tia noticed the particularly dour look on G'narish's face and the absence of his Weyrwoman Nadira. A quick scan of the recording her body had made of the fall, gave her the explanation of her absence. A wave of sorrow and sympathy for G'narish overwhelmed her momentarily.

After everyone had settled in and been served, F'lar called for their attention requesting everyone's report on the results of today's threadfall. The first order of business was the casualty report. The best news was that despite all the difficulties presented by this particular threadfall, there had been no fatalities to report. There was a general cheer in response to this news. Next each Weyrleader gave a counting of the number and severity of the non-fatal casualties for their weyr.

After G'narish finished the accounting for Igen Weyr Jaxom inquired sympathetically. "How are Nadira and Kylanith doing?"

The look of sorrow deepened on his face as he paused, then G'narish replied. "They were both very seriously scored." He paused taking a deep breath. ". . . but the healers say that they will both survive." He glanced around at the sympathetic faces. "Nadira's entire left side was badly scored and the healers are keeping her asleep while her body heals. They say that it will be four or five seven-days before she will be healed enough to get around on her own." He paused again, the lines on his face deepened as he frowned. "They say that the thread did a lot of deep damage to the shoulder joint of Kylanith's left wing. They don't know if she will ever be able to fly again."

The hall was filled with a stunned silence as everyone absorbed this terrible news.

Finally the silence was broken by Lessa. "Don't give up hope yet G'narish. Nobody thought Golanth would ever fly again yet F'lessan flew thread on Golanth in the Queen's wing today and they acquitted themselves very well."

G'narish's face brightened at Lessa's words. "Thank-you, Lessa. I will be sure to remind Nadira of that when she is finally awake."

After all the reports were done Masterharper Sebell looked up from the paper that he had been scribbling on and spoke. "That comes to just over a hundred serious injuries with about twenty Riders and their dragons on the disabled list. Thanks to the efforts of Lord Jaxom and Alexander there were less than a few dozen burrows for the ground crews to deal with. This threadfall was bad . . . but it was nowhere as serious as it could have been and our losses were unusually light. Tia's thinning out of the incoming thread made all the difference."

Lessa jumped in adding her thanks as well. "Tia's advanced reports of the fall patterns were immensely helpful. Normally we have to gage the fall patterns on the fly, just barely keeping up with any rapid pattern shifts. This time we were able to anticipate the shifts well ahead of time and be ready for them."

Jaxom placed his hand on Alexander's shoulder. "We all owe you and Tia a lot for your help today."

Tia responded. "You owe us nothing. We were glad that we were able to be of some help."

Wine and food flowed freely and conversation soon moved on to other subjects, but several of the dragonriders took a moment at some point to quietly express their gratitude to Alex and Tia and their sympathy to G'narish.

~ o ~

A few hours later the dragonriders began to depart for their home weyrs and much needed rest. Finally F'lar and Lessa were the only ones left. They strode up to Alex and Tia. F'lar clapped Alex and Tia on the shoulder. "I just wanted to thank you both again for everything you did for us and to extend an invitation to you." He glanced over at Lessa who smiled and nodded back before continuing. "Ramoth's latest clutch of eggs is due to break shell tomorrow and we would like to invite you both to the hatching."

Jaxom and Sharra came up to them at that moment. Jaxom clapped Alex companionably on the shoulder. "That is quite an honor to be invited to a Benden hatching."

Sharra added. "We are going to be there. I hope you both will join us."

Alex paused a moment. "We, ah, really appreciate the honor, aahh . . ." He glanced over at Tia unsure how to respond.

Tia's eyes glazed over for the barest moment then stepped in covering for Alex. "What Alex is unsuccessfully trying to say is that we both appreciate the offer very much but that I will not be able to attend." She glanced at Alex then continued. "Benden is very far from here and because of the nature of what I am, I simply can't go that far from my ship. In order to attend an event that far away, my ship, and therefore my living body, would have to be within less than twenty kilometers of the Weyr or this . . ." She indicated her synthetic body. ". . . would arrive as little more than a soulless mechanical robot." She shrugged. "We've seen enough examples of how uncomfortable others get around this avatar body when I'm not fully linked to it."

Lessa and F'lar were both momentarily taken aback by this development. It took a second for them both to mentally shift their viewpoint. F'lar remarked scratching his head uncertainly. "It is easy to forget that this is not your real living body. You look so alive when you are . . ." He blinked dredging up the word. "Linked, I believe you call it, to your . . ."

Lessa jumped in. "I think the word was Avatar." Lessa paused thinking hard then finally responded. "How foolish of us not to think of this. That is easy enough problem to deal with. There is a very large meadow inside the bowl of Benden Weyr. There is more than enough room on that meadow for you to land your ship. That way you will be able to attend. We will keep an area over by the lake clear so that you can land there."

Tia smiled. "In that case we will be happy to attend."

Alex spoke up. "What time should we get there?"

F'lar shrugged. "Dragons are notoriously unpredictable when it comes to predicting exactly when they will break shell. It would be best to arrive early. I would suggest an hour after sunrise Benden time."

Lessa continued. "We treat it almost like an all day 'gather' with a hatching occurring at some point during the festivities."

"Oh, I see." Alex responded. "We will be there."

"Good." F'lar remarked. "We will see you tomorrow, then." F'lar put his arm around Lessa'a back and together they went out the door to be met by their dragons.

Alex, Tia, Jaxom and Sharra watched as the two dragonriders mounted their dragons. Then with a whoosh of down-swept wings and swirling dusty air, the two dragons lifted off and climbed to about a hundred meters then vanished in the blink of an eye.

The four of them entered the hold and Jaxom closed and locked the great front doors.

Sharra turned to Alex and Tia. "You may want to get some rest. Tomorrow will be a long busy day and it will start early."

Jaxom jumped in. "Do you want me to send a drudge in to wake you in the morning?"

Tia shook her head. "That won't be necessary. I have already calculated the time differential and the time of sunrise in Benden. I will simply have the AI wake us up when it is time to get ready."

Sharra paused a moment and blinked as she again had to readjust her perception of Tia. "Like Jaxom said earlier, sometimes I forget that you are your spaceship. The concept is difficult to get used to." She looked at Tia with a bemused smile. "Your life must be very interesting." Sharra shrugged. "We will see you in the morning then."

Alex and Tia headed off to their guest room as Jaxom and Sharra turned and headed off to their own quarters.

~ o ~

As they were settling in for the night Alex turned to Tia. "It just occurred to me; did you ever get a chance to check out your recording of their big meeting yesterday?" Alex pause in surprise as he stretched, trying to ease the achyness in his joints and muscles. "Was that really only yesterday?"

Tia chuckled. "Yes, it really was **only** yesterday." She laid her hand on his shoulder. "Lay down and I'll rub your back for you."

Alex complied and was soon enjoying the feel of her hands kneading the weary aches and pains out of his overworked muscles. As she worked on him she continued speaking. "While I was running the sweeps of the leading edge of . . . threadfall, I was also listening to the recordings of their meetings. They are all very worried about what our presence could mean to their planet. They are afraid that once their existence is known, Central Worlds will move in and take over. There was a strong contingent among the Lord Holders that felt the best way to protect their society was to prevent us from leaving Pern. Among that group there were calls for everything from imprisoning us to destroying my ship in order to prevent us from being able to leave. I think the one called Toric was more than willing to do anything, up to and including killing us, to keep us from leaving."

Alex looked back over his shoulder at her. "You're kidding." His brows furrowed. "Tia, just how much danger are we really in, here?"

Tia shook her head. "I think, very little, if any. All they really want is to be left alone to run their planet in the way that suits them best. Most of them favored appointing that small group that stayed behind to feel us out and see if we could be talked into keeping quiet about Pern. They just want to be able to maintain their isolation and live their lives without outside interference."

Alex thought a minute before responding. "I think, if we present this to the council right, we can convince Central Worlds to declare this system off limits. Considering the considerable abilities of their dragons, I think we can leave it to them to deal with any unwanted intrusion. In fact we could use the abilities of those dragons as a trump card should Central Worlds become obstinate. Who wants an enemy that can teleport **unimpeded** into your most heavily fortified installations."

His mind settled for now on that question, Alex relaxed and allowed himself to drift off into a pleasant haze of contentment as Tia's ministrations eased away the aftermath of the day's exertions. Once he was sufficiently relaxed, Tia lay down beside him and he wrapped his arms around her. She snuggled more tightly into his embrace and felt a matching contentment stealing through her being. Moment's later Alex was sound asleep.

After leaving enough comlink channels open so that she would know if Alex moved, Tia shifted her attention back to her ship and began checking out all her systems and making sure the ship was secure for the night. Once she had assured herself that she and her ship were secure, Tia returned her full attention to her avatar, reveling in the feel of his arms around her. After a while she allowed herself to slip into the soft folds of sleep where she dreamed of shooting through fields of stars with Alex folded in her arms and escorted by a wing of Pern's miraculous dragons.

~ DRnBS ~

At a prompt from one of her AI's Tia was suddenly wide awake. It was time to get ready for the day. She looked into the sleeping face of Alex, smiled, then she kissed him. Alex's eyes blinked open trying, only half successfully, to wake up. "Wake up Alex. We have a Hatching to attend." Tia told him adding a few more kisses.

As Alex stirred and stretched, Tia heard Ruth's voice in her head. '_Must hurry, the sun will be rising soon over my birthplace._'

_'Your birth place?'_ Tia enquired as she watched Alex stretch, very much enjoying the view.

'_You two are good for each other, like Jaxom and Sharra_.' The voice commented out of the blue. Then after a second Ruth continued. '_Bendon is where I broke shell and joined Jaxom_.'

'_You remember that event?_' Tia remarked in surprise. Ruth's remark had distracted Tia's attention from Alex's body.

'_Yes I do_.' Came the voice of Ruth. '_I was trapped inside my shell, unable to break free. Jaxom felt my need and broke my shell for me. Then he cut the tough inner skin and freed me. Then our minds met and we were joined_.' The voice in her head was suffused with love, admiration and awe. '_After that we belonged to each other. He is my rider and I am his dragon_.'

Tia was amazed at the strength of the bond that she could sense between Jaxom and Ruth and she asked. '_So the bond between dragon and rider forms when the dragon first emerges from his shell?_'

'_Yes_.'

'_How do the pairings get determined?_' Her curiosity became rampant.

'_The new dragon chooses its rider when it first hatches_.' Ruth replied.

_'No wonder the Hatching is such a big thing_.' She thought back with some surprise.

'_A hatching determines the course of many lives_.' Ruth responded self-assuredly.

Noticing the slightly distracted look on Tia's face, Alex asked. "Tia, what's happening?"

Tia shook herself out of her daze and told Alex what she had just learned from her short conversation with Ruth. For the next few minutes they both contemplated the implications of what would soon be happening at Benden Weyr while they prepared for another very unusual day on this very unusual planet.

_**Continued in Part 11**_

_( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and _'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	11. Benden Weyr

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

**Chapter** **11 : ****************Benden Weyr**

Alex and Tia entered the main hall to find Jaxom and Sharra waiting for them. Jaxom spoke. "Ruth said you would be down shortly." He clasped Alexander's hand. "Are you ready to witness something miraculous?"

Tia responded. "We are certainly looking forward to the experience."

"I assume you know where Benden Weyr is located." Jaxom remarked.

Tia nodded and smiled self assuredly back at him. "I have the grid coordinates and I have it located on my planetary maps. I also have the old overhead survey images of it from the original Yokohama's imaging database. I will have no problem finding it."

Jaxom returned Tia's grin. "Alright then, let's fly."

Together the four of them entered the courtyard where Ruth was waiting. As Alex and Tia climbed into the grav-sled, Jaxom and Sharra mounted Ruth. Jaxom and Sharra both pumped their fists at Alex and Tia in a gesture that they recognized a combination of salute, call to battle and invitation to take wing, depending on the situation. "See you at Benden!" Jaxom called out then Ruth sprang up and began to climb high above the courtyard. Moments later Ruth and his passengers vanished as the grav-sled rose from the ground.

Alex sighed. "That is incredible."

Seconds later Alex guided the grav-sled into Tia's hold. A minute later they were both strapped into the two acceleration chairs in her control room.

"What's our ETA to Benden Weyr?" Alex inquired as the main control panel powered up.

Tia responded. "With optimum course vectors and maximum safe velocity we should arrive over Benden Weyr in thirty-two minutes." Tia's eyes lost their life and her expression went totally blank as she switch off her connection to her avatar to take full control of her ship. "Lift off in five seconds." She announced over the main cabin speaker.

Alex felt the barely perceptible excitement that always accompanied lift-off. Then he was pressed into his seat as Tia rose rapidly from the ground. Ten seconds later when she had reached significant safe altitude Alex was forced hard into his seat as she poured on the acceleration. Tia hadn't been kidding when she said 'maximum safe velocity' although he thought she may have been stretching the safe description just a bit.

Ten minutes later the acceleration eased off as she coasted in sub-orbital space. Alex swiveled his chair around and faced the video sensor on the central column with a grin. "You just can't resist hotrodding it can you." He remarked. He had found that term in some old historical records once. It was supposed to refer to pushing wheeled ground vehicles to their maximum limits. Since then they had both used that term when referring to both of their piloting styles. The term usually left their colleagues, who were unfamiliar with the term, totally perplexed.

"Well we don't want to waste any time and I know you weren't interested in getting up any earlier than we did." She responded.

"Show-off." He retorted with a grin.

"Lazybones." She replied.

Twelve minutes later the heavy force returned as she dropped out of sub-orbital space and descended toward Benden Weyr. When the force pushing Alex into his chair eased up he looked at the main view screen to see that they were directly above the caldera of a dead volcano and slowly dropping toward the ground. He could clearly make out the lake at one end of the great bowl. The light of the rising sun reached about halfway down the walls of the bowl. Next to the lake was a cleared and roped off area large enough for Tia to land, just as F'lar had told them. Along the outer ridges and perched at many of the hundreds of cave openings were hundreds of dragons. At the opposite side of the caldera they could clearly make out the white form of Ruth. He was curled up on a wide ledge a quarter of the way up the caldera wall outside a large cave opening. A large portion of the bowl floor was taken up by what appeared to be a large open air party. There were tent's surrounding open areas and lots of people milling around getting things set up.

As Tia dropped toward her landing area more and more of the people on the volcano's floor looked up and followed her descent with their eyes. Twenty seconds later Tia was on the ground and people began to move towards her ship. A half a minute later, after she had secured her ship, Tia's avatar came back to vibrant life as she resumed control of it.

They exited using her external lift and were soon surrounded by dozens of curious people, all wanting to get a look at the visitors from beyond their world. Alex and Tia tried to act as gracious toward those around them as they could while making their way across the floor of the weyr.

They had made it about a third of the way when Alex spotted F'lar and Lessa approaching the crowd. Soon everyone was respectfully parting to let the Weyrleaders through. Jaxom and Sharra were right behind them.

"Welcome to Benden Weyr." F'lar called out. "You're just in time. We are just about ready to open up the 'Gather' for business."

"Thank-you for your invitation." Tia responded. "Um, what is a 'Gather'?" She inquired.

Jaxom let out a short quiet laugh. "A 'Gather' is when we get together to trade goods, stories and generally have fun. A new hatching is always a good excuse for a Gather while we wait for the eggs to hatch and to celebrate afterward."

Lessa spoke up. "Come, let us show you around." She took Alex and Tia's elbows and led them across the floor of the bowl.

As they approached the area where many tent like structures had been set up they noticed a green dragon coming in for a landing on the open field beside Tia's ship. They paused to watch as four people, two male and two female, dismounted. A moment later over a dozen of the tiny fire-lizards appeared above the group then the dragon took wing and joined the others gathered along the rim of the weyr. The four people stared up at Tia's ship for several seconds while the flock of fire-lizards wheeled and circled noisily above the four newcomers and Tia's ship. Finally the fire-lizards shot off as a group toward the gather tents then, a couple of seconds later, the newcomers also headed toward the gather area. Tia and Alex recognized Master Harpers Sebell and Menolly among the newcomers. The other male was a tall dark headed man in his thirties. The female was obviously the green dragons rider.

As the four got closer Jaxom waved to attract their attention. "Sebell, Menolly, Mirrim, Piemer, over here." Jaxom smiled at the newcomers as they walked up. "Alex, Tia, This is Mirrim and Piemer."

Piemer held out his hand to Alex. "We've already heard about you both from Master Sebell and Master Menolly. I have heard some very unusual things about you." He nodded toward Tia. "I am looking forward to the chance to get to know you both better."

Mirrim frowned at Tia. "Is it true that you are really inside a metal container inside that ship?" She waved her hand at the spaceship behind them.

"Mirrim!" Jaxom barked as the other's rolled their eyes at her forthright abruptness.

Alex and Tia laughed and Tia launched into a description of herself and her situation. Mirrim was skeptical until her dragon confirmed that Tia really was currently inside the ship. Piemer was completely fascinated by what Tia told them and seemed to catch on quickly. Tia finished her explanation just as they reached the Gather area.

By now most of the merchant stalls were open for business and Alex and Tia were soon deeply engrossed in examining the varied and remarkable wares for sale. As they looked in the various stalls the ten of them exchanged tidbits about their various lives and tried to answer occasional questions. After about an hour they all wandered over to an area where dozens of tables had been set up and had a breakfast of cheese, pastries and fruit.

It was shortly after their breakfast and the 'Gather' seemed to be in full swing when Menolly and Sebell lead their group over to an open square with a small stage on one side and many tables filled with noisy patrons under large tents on the other three sides. On the stage were about a dozen people tuning up various instruments and conversing among themselves. Sebel and Menolly approached the stage while F'lar and Lessa led the rest of their group to a large empty table near the stage. The noise level dropped dramatically as many of those nearby expressed greetings to the new arrivals. Sensing that something worth saving was about to happen, Tia chose a seat that gave her a clear view of the entire stage and set one of the AI's back on her ship to recording the video and audio sensory inputs from her avatar.

Menolly and Sebell took the places that had apparently been reserved for them at the center of the stage then they were each handed their instruments. Ten of the fire-lizards that seemed to be so common throughout the Gather flew in and settled around the stage. The area became so quiet that you could have heard a feather drop. After a few quick words the musicians began to play. It was quickly obvious that they were quite talented as they launched into a happy song that was about the hatching and impression of new dragons. The crowd loved it and many of them were singing along.

Tia and Alex were enthralled by the beautiful music. At one point Tia noticed in the instrumental harmonies a particularly beautiful sounding instrument that was vaguely reminiscent of a violin or a flute but she couldn't identify what it was or who might be playing it.

The next song was sung mostly by Menolly with Sebell filling in as counterpoint and turned out to be a tale about Lessa's miraculous jump through time itself to save Pern from a shortage of dragons. That was when Tia realized that the instrument she hadn't been able to identify was actually the fire-lizards. The ten fire-lizards perched around the stage were accompanying Menolly. Some were singing harmony and some were singing a soaring delicate descant in counterpoint to her song.

Alex meanwhile glanced over at F'lar and saw him gazing at Lessa with a look of pride and admiration in his face. This brought home the realization that this song was an historical report of an actual event. He was amazed by the understanding that if this song were true then the dragons actually had the ability to teleport between time as well as space. The implications were awesome and a bit frightening. Every time he thought he had a handle on the great beasts some new piece of information showed that they were even more powerful than he thought.

The song finally came to an end to thunderous applause. The next song had Sebell singing the lead with the other's singing back-up and harmony. Again the fire-lizards sang counter point and descant. This song turned out to be about how a very young Jaxom and Ruth jumped through time and space to rescue a stolen queen dragon egg and prevent a disaster of war between two dragonrider factions. Again this was apparently a report of an actual historical event. Alexander's respect for the Lord Holder and rider of white Ruth increased several notches over what he had done to save their world.

Once the song was finished, again to thunderous applause, the other musicians set aside their instruments and only Sebell and Menolly played the intro to the next song. It was apparent by the expressions around them that no one recognized this new song. Menolly sang the lead with Sebell supplying simple harmony. The ten fire-lizards were again singing harmony and some were singing an obviously improvised soaring descant in counterpoint. The new song began with a happy playful melody as it described a young girl happily playing among desolate abandoned ruins in a faraway place while her parents looked for clues about the ancient civilization. The harmony shifted to heavy somber tones as it told of the little girl being struck down by a terrible disease that robbed her of touch and motion and how she nearly died her before the disease was stopped. The sadness of the song deepened and described the girl's desperate plight as she lay there, alive only by way of many machines and unable to ever again move or touch.

At this point Tia realized with a shock that the song was about her. She glanced around at the audience and saw tears in many of the eyes around her. The song's images were so powerful even she felt its affect.

The song's harmonies and tempo changed again into an upbeat hopeful march as the destitute child was offered a chance at a new kind of life. It told of her being sealed in a life sustaining shell and learning how to control her motorized shell and all types of mechanical devices through direct connection to her living brain.

The music again changed to a soaring triumphant tune as it told about the, now mature and educated, girl being mounted inside and connected to a vessel that sailed the vast seas of space. It told of her running free through the vastness of space exploring hundreds of incredible planets with her brave male companion. Next it told in warm romantic tones of the creation of an artificial body so that the girl could again experience human physical contact with other people.

Without so much as a break they launched into a second song with a martial tone as the new song told the story of Tia and Alex finding the planet Pern and helping to save the planet from an unusual and disastrously heavy threadfall. It was a rousing song of danger and triumph that lifted the spirits of all who heard it.

As the final notes died away there was total silence and the crowd, as one looked out at Tia's gleaming ship, standing tall, over at the edge of the lake. Then most eyes swiveled around to look over at the table where Tia and Alex sat. First only a few began to clap enthusiastically but the applause quickly spread, joined by loud cheering, until it was overpowering, only to then be joined by the roaring of the dragons perched along the weyr's rim. It was apparent that the enthusiastic tribute of the crowd and the dragons was as much for Tia and Alex as it was for the new song. If Tia had been capable of blushing she would have.

Once the uproar finally died down Menolly launched into the fire-lizard song as everyone enthusiastically joined in. It was obviously a well known and very popular song. Once that song ended Menoly and Sebell left the stage, to more loud cheers, and headed over to join the rest at their table.

The rest of the musicians launched into a purely instrumental song that was meant for dancing and couples began moving out to the central open space to do just that.

Alex was the first to speak. There was awe in his voice. "Where did you come up with that song about Tia?"

Master Sebell glanced over at Menolly with a proud proprietary grin. "One of Menolly's many talents is the ability to turn any event into a song in less time than it takes a dragon to break shell." He took her hand. "Most of Pern has heard rumors at least about you and we knew that you and your ship needed to be explained. Menolly created that song last night and taught me the basic melody. Early this morning Menolly decided that the song should be broken into two songs. This was that songs first public performance. The harmonies were improvised just now on the spot by her fire-lizards. I just tried desperately to keep up and not hit any sour notes."

As a second song started up, F'lar stood up and held out his hand to Tia. "Would you care to dance with me?" He took her hand and drew her out to the dance floor. A few seconds later Lessa dragged Alex out to the dance floor where they were soon joined by Sebell and Menolly.

_**Continued in Part 12**_

_( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and _'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	12. The Hatching

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

**Chapter** **12 : ********************The Hatching**

As the dance with F'lar came to an end, Tia was surprised when Lord Jaxom stepped up to her and requested a dance. As Jaxom spun her around the clearing to an upbeat fast moving song, she spotted F'lar partnered with Lessa and Alex partnered with Lady Sharra.

Jaxom asked if she was enjoying her first 'Gather'. She smiled back at him and responded that she was enjoying herself immensely. Jaxom then told her about some of the history of 'Gathers' with a few humorous anecdotes thrown in.

The next dance, also an upbeat fast moving song, found Tia partnered with Sebell and Alex partnered with Menolly. Because of the energetic nature of this dance there was not a lot of conversation involved, just a lot of exercise.

As the next song, more of a waltz, began Tia turned around looking for Alex and found herself facing Lord Holder Groghe. He bowed politely to her. "It's nice to see you again. May I have this dance?" He took her hand and pulled her smoothly into the waltz. For such a large grizzled older man he was surprisingly graceful on the dance floor. His next comment made her wonder if he could read her mind. "I'm afraid at my age this is the most energetic type of dance that I can handle."

She smiled back at him. "Well you do it very well Lord Groghe."

His eyes crinkled as he smiled back. "Thank-you." He twirled her once and pulled her back in. How long are you going to be staying on Pern?"

Amused at the man's straight forward demeanor, Tia thought a moment before replying. "Normally we probably would have collected the necessary data and left by now but yesterday's threadfall and today's hatching have delayed things a bit." She shrugged. "To be honest, I find your planet and your culture fascinating and we have no hard and fast schedule for this particular mission. According to my current contract with Central Planets, as long as we follow our planed course and check in regularly to let them know that we are still around, we are free to adjust our schedule as we deem necessary." She shrugged. "I think we may decide to stay here for a few more days at least. Get to know your people and culture better and get in a little R-n-R, like today, while we're at it."

Lord Groghe seemed to think over her reply for several seconds then commented. "You know, everyone is wondering what you will tell your masters about us after you leave here." He twirled her again. "Many are afraid that your people might want to come in, take over and start running our world."

Tia realized that for Lord Groghe this dance had more than one purpose. He was using it to speak to her one-on-one and feel her out about Pern's future. "Alex and I are really not sure yet what we are going to say in our report. We have to file some kind of report on every colony that we are supposed to be investigating and it will have to be a factually correct report . . . but there are many different ways to present the same facts."

Tia paused to consider how best to express to Lord Groghe what she wanted to say. While she was thinking he twirled her around again. "And what will those facts be?" He inquired in a deceptively mild tone of voice.

After a few seconds she continued speaking. "You have a very nice world here despite the difficulties your people face and we don't want your planet interfered with. What we want to emphasize in our report is that you do not want or need outside help. That should be enough to satisfy most of those in charge. We will probably also emphasize that you are more than capable of defending yourselves from unwanted interference which, we hope, will discourage the more obstinate do-gooders. As for the general public we will recommend that all information on Pern be restricted. That is the essence of what we wish to do in our final report on Pern."

Lord Groghe nodded his understanding. By his thoughtful expression Tia felt that her response had helped him settle some things in his mind. When the music ended he again bowed to her and thanked her for the dance. He then walked over and joined several other men that she was sure were other lord holders.

For the next dance Tia found herself partnered with Alex as the musicians began a slower very romantic piece. Tia soon quit worrying about Lord Groghe's questions and was again thoroughly enjoying herself.

After the dance the musicians left the stage and everyone returned to their table. F'lar ordered a round of sweet cool fruity drinks for everyone and they all relaxed to listen as a new group of young musicians took the stage. The first song of the new set was a ballad about someone named Moreta's efforts to save Pern from a plague. Tia was informed that this was also a record of an actual event that had happened over a thousand years ago. Next came a song about the dolphins of Pern. Every song in the set was about some aspect of Pern's history.

After that group finished their set people began serving food to all the tables. Tia had been enjoying herself so much that she had lost track of time and was surprised that it was already lunchtime. Platters of meats and bowls of fruits and vegetables were set in the center of each table and each person got a metal plate. They were expected to serve themselves from the food in the center of the table.

Mirrim noticed that Tia was not eating and commented about it.

Tia shrugged, gesturing toward herself. "This is essentially an electrically powered mechanical body so there is no point in consuming food. They have so far only been able to give me three of the five senses, sight, hearing and touch. They have yet to be able to simulate taste and smell. I suspect that it is because the first three are essentially mechanical in nature where as the other two are chemical in nature and very complex." She paused. "Losing those two senses is the only thing I really miss about my previous life. But in the long run I think the tradeoff was worth it for all the things I gained as a shell person." Tia noticed that several at the table nodded their approval of her attitude.

After their lunch was finished they decided to take another stroll around the gather. Tia was examining a belt with an intricate metal buckle shaped like a dragon in flight when she became aware of an unearthly keening that rapidly rose in volume and rang through her skull. Then it abruptly stopped. There was a great deal of hustle and bustle as everyone began making their way in the same general direction. The unnerving sound returned urging everyone along.

F'lar grabbed her hand and spoke to her. "The hatching has begun. Follow us."

Tia noticed that her small group was hanging close together as they moved along with the crowd. A flurry of shadows passed overhead causing Tia to look up. The sky was full of dragons, many carrying riders, all aiming for the same great cave opening halfway up the volcano wall, ahead of them. The dragons were flying so close together as they passed through that opening that she thought it a miracle that they didn't collide.

The crowd was soon passing through a very large opening into a short tunnel. The tunnel opened out onto a huge cavern. Because of the crowd around her Tia couldn't see much more than the roof of the cavern but from what she could see the chamber must have taken up most of the wall of the inactive volcano that was Benden Weyr. She soon noticed that the sandy floor they were walking on was extremely warm. The temperature didn't bother her but she noticed several of those around her were picking up their feet a bit more quickly.

Soon they reached a series of raised wide stone tiers along one wall that served as bleachers for the spectators. There were also many stone ledges all around the walls of the cavern where the dragons were now perched in serried ranks their riders seated beside them.

The group settled onto one of the nearer stone rows. Tia was now able to get a better view of the floor of the cavern. Near the center of the cavern was a group of about two dozen mottled eggs that were just large enough to have contained a standard size human. Hovering protectively over them was the great golden bulk of Ramoth. Tia could sense the dragon's concerned excitement then was surprised when Ramoth mentally acknowledged Tia's presence. She looked up and saw the dragon's head swivel scanning the crowd at the same time she heard the words '_Where are you?_' in her head.

Tia waved her hands above her head and the dragon's gaze locked in on her. She felt Ramoth's '_Welcome_.' in her head then the dragon's gaze returned to the clutch of eggs.

Lessa looked over at Tia. "Ramoth really does understand your situation doesn't she. She is aware of your presence inside your ship but she knew that your . . . Avatar, as you call it, was here in the hatching grounds."

Mnementh, F'lar's bronze dragon responded a bit proudly. '_Ramoth is smart_.'

This produced a chuckle from F'lar and a laugh from Lessa.

Just as the crowd was settling into their seats, a group of about thirty or so youngsters wearing simple white knee length tunics entered the cavern. They trooped across the very warm sand over to the area where the eggs sat and formed a semicircle around the eggs. They appeared to just be hitting puberty. Jaxom informed her that they were the candidates for impression. Tia noticed that about a third of the candidates were female.

Jaxom commented quietly. "When I was their age there would have only been boys out there since there are no queen dragon eggs this time. Ever since Mirrium impressed Path they have allowed girls to ride fighting dragons." He frowned. "This is the first time that Ramoth has not produced at least one queen egg."

"How do you tell a queen egg?" Tia asked.

"Queen eggs are about fifteen to twenty percent larger than the other eggs." He responded.

As Tia was looking around taking in the immense cavern she noticed three eggs that were much smaller than the rest pushed off into a far corner. Two of them, one a nearly pure white and the other a mottled yellow, were half the size of the rest of the eggs sitting out on the sandy hatching ground. The third was a tiny mottled grey and black egg that was only a quarter the size of all the other eggs.

The small yellow egg was slowly rocking. Tia was reminded of the story of Jaxom and Ruth and wondered if anyone would do anything. Jaxom noticed the direction of Tia's gaze and remarked on it. "Often there will be a few imperfect eggs that don't hatch. When the rare one does manage to hatch the defective dragonet doesn't survive very long. Ruth is the only known exception to that rule." The movements of the egg quickly got weaker and within seconds had ceased. Jaxom continued somewhat sadly. "The movements were too weak and didn't last long at all. That one would not have survived even if it had broken shell."

At that moment Tia became aware of a strong feeling of 'need'. An almost overpowering desire to reach some nebulous goal as her attention was drawn to the center of the floor where the eggs had begun to rock and jerk. The strong mental sensation she was receiving was coming from those eggs.

A large piece at the top of one of the eggs split off from the shell. The egg rolled to its side and a glistening wet green dragon about the same size as the candidates fell out of the hole in the shell. Almost as one, all of the boys held back as if to give the girls first shot at the green dragonet. Creeling out her need the little green hatchling lurched forward toward one of the girls. She took a step forward and grabbed the creatures head, forcing it to look at her. Tia felt the emotions of the new hatchling shift from driving need to recognition then Tia felt an overpowering all consuming joy sweep through the young hatchling. At the same time, out on the hatching grounds the young girl's face broke out in a look of such joy that it was practically blinding in its intensity. In her mind, Tia heard the new dragonet say. '_I am Corenth_.' "She said her name is Corenth." The brand new dragonrider announced happily. She wrapped her arms around the green hatchlings neck in welcome. The flood of emotions from the infant dragon at impression caused a wave of warm happiness to fill Tia as a soft barely audible sigh escaped her synthetic lips.

The next instant another egg split right down the middle and a bronze dragonet flopped nose first into the sand. This time it was the girls that held back and the boys surged forward. The dragonet appeared to be stuck and one daring boy stepped forward and pulled the bronze creatures head from the sand. The creature pulled back shaking its head. The boy quickly backed off then nearly dived to the side as the bronze dragonet lunged for another boy. The other boy stepped toward the dragonet and the next instant they were bonding. Like the first one, Tia felt the waves of emotions of bonding and heard the hatchling announce his name to his newly bonded rider.

In rapid succession the rest of the eggs began hatching and soon the sandy floor was a chaotic scene of shell fragments and bonding pairs. As each hatchling and candidate pair bonded, the new dragonrider would get a blindingly joyous smile on his or her face and would announce the new dragon's name.

Some of the pairings produced cheers from groups in the crowd. Alex figured that they must be friends, coworkers or family of the successful candidate. He stared at the amazing spectacle in rapt amazement.

A gasp went up as one of the candidates failed to get out of the way fast enough and the single minded bronze hatchling stepped on his leg, raking it with his talons, on his way to another candidate that was standing just beyond the injured boy. Two large men that Alex had not noticed before ran out to the injured boy picked him up and moved him back away from the eggs. They liberally slathered some greasy tan substance over the gashes and wrapped the injured leg in some type of white material. The boy loudly claimed that he was alright and insisted on returning to the group of candidates. To Alex's surprise, despite his disabling injury, the two healers allowed it.

Jaxom commented. "The candidates know to step aside if the hatchling is not interested in them but despite the best training such accidents do sometimes happen. It's one of the hazards a candidate must face."

Ten seconds later the injured boy was bonding with a brown hatchling and reassuring the dragonet that he was not hurt too bad.

Alex glanced over at Tia to comment on the spectacle only to see that her eyes were glazed over and she seemed to be completely lost within herself. He tried to get her attention but she was totally oblivious. This wasn't the totally blank expression he would see when Tia disconnected from the avatar; tThere was still life in her eyes. It was more like the expression of one that was completely overwhelmed by very powerful emotion.

Soon those around Alex and Tia became aware of Tia's odd state and Alex's distress. Lessa asked what was wrong and Alex was forced to admit that he had no idea what was happening to Tia.

Just as the last dragon bonded with its new rider, Tia finally snapped out of her fugue state and looked at Alexander. "I felt it, Alex. Every time one of them bonded . . . I felt it." She blinked, the look of unimaginable wonder still filling her face. "It was incredible."

The bonded dragonrider pairs began making their way toward the lower cavern entrance. Tia blinked as she again felt waves of that overpowering need. She looked around but she could not figure out where it was coming from. All of the eggs had hatched. Then her glance was drawn, by something she could not explain, over to the three undersized eggs by the cavern wall.

Suddenly the black and gray egg rocked once then seemed to explode. In the middle of the shattered shell fragments a small black dragonet about a quarter the size of the other hatchlings lay flat on its back. Crying piteously, the undersized black hatchling rolled over onto its feet, looked around, and then began to make its unsteady way in the same direction as the other hatchlings

_**Continued in Part 13**_

_( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and _'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	13. A Little Black Dragon

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

_**Author's Note:**______ Once again I apologize for taking so long in updating this story. It seems that life keeps getting in the way of all my plans. Please bear with me and I will continue to post new chapters as quickly as possible._

* * *

**Chapter 13 : A ********Little Black Dragon**

The small black dragon's steps rapidly gained assurance as it made its determined way toward the lower hatching cavern entrance. Unlike with all the other hatchlings, none of those unattached candidates tried to entice or intercept the small black creature. All of them quickly got out of its way. Many of them exhibited looks of pity or disgust. None of them had the slightest interest in impressing the sad undersized misshapen beast. Tia could still sense the black dragonet's need and immediately felt sorry for the poor unwanted hatchling. He was looking for something specific and was single-mindedly making his way toward it.

Tia studied the small newly hatched black dragon as it made its way past their position in the stands. It was already losing much of its initial clumsiness and was moving pretty quickly. The little black hatchling was about twice the size of the largest firelizards. Its hide was jet black and had a pebbly texture rather than the smooth texture of the other dragons. Its shape was off as well. Its snout was shorter and rounder; its neck was so short as to be nearly non-existent; its wings were about thirty percent shorter and forty percent wider relative to its body; the fins along the sides of its tail were three times as wide; its legs were also much shorter and stouter; and its neck ridges were far more prominent and jagged than normal. All the correct parts were there (same number of fingers, toes and wing bones, same swirling multifaceted eyes) but the relative dimensions were all wrong. If it survived and grew as much as other dragons then it would probably end up being less than half the size of Ruth. Even if it could fly with those stubby wings it would be unable to carry a rider into battle against the deadly thread.

F'lar, Lessa and Jaxom started down out of the stands followed by Sebell, Menolly, Sharra, Alex and Tia. By the time they reached the floor of the hatching grounds the little black dragon was more than halfway to the lower cavern entrance and moving fairly fast.

"Where is it going?" F'lar asked as he turned to follow the creature, shaking his head.

"I don't know." Lessa responded as she fell into step beside him, a worried frown on her face. "I just don't want it upsetting the other hatchlings."

Jaxom and Sharra were right behind Lessa and F'lar. "This could be disastrous." Jaxom commented.

Tia and Alex both glanced over at Jaxom and Sharra in curiosity. "What do you mean?" Tia asked them.

Sebell was the one that answered. "The last time a hatchling left the hatching grounds without impressing, she ended up sitting out in the open and doing nothing but making a nerve wracking cry for almost two seven-days until she finally died."

Lessa noticed that the black dragon had just disappeared through the lower cavern entrance and speeded up. "We'd better hurry up. We're losing it."

The others increased their pace to keep up with Lessa as they tried following the little black dragonet out of the cavern. Tia pulled just a bit ahead of the others in her haste to get to the distressed creature and help it any way she could. Alex moved up beside her wondering what she had in mind. Tia's main thought was that she would be happy to befriend the desperate creature if she could just get its attention.

As the group exited the cavern they could hear a lot of commotion coming from the area where all the tents were set up and the trail of destruction was plain to see. Alex glanced at the others. "What is going on?"

Tia responded. "The little black dragon is tearing its way through the gather area."

By now it seemed obvious that the little black dragonet was making a beeline toward Tia's ship. Jaxom looked over at Tia as he spoke. "Tia, it's trying to get to you. It wants to bond with you."

Tia shook her head as she responded. "No I don't think so. I'm not feeling the same type of irresistible need, the all encompassing pull, that I felt in the other hatchlings earlier. And this hatchling is male. He is a he." She looked over at Lessa who had pulled up beside her. "What I'm feeling from him **is** a strong need, but it is quite different from what I felt in all the other hatchlings."

Lessa looked back at Tia in surprise. "You were in contact with the new hatchlings during impression?"

Tia looked back at Lessa and shrugged at the slightly scandalized look in her eyes. "Yes . . . was that wrong of me?"

Lessa was silent for several seconds and F'lar answered for her. "I don't really know if there is anything necessarily wrong with it. No one has ever thought of it before and most riders can only speak with their own dragon." He paused several more seconds before continuing. "Impression is such a very intensely personal thing. During impression the mind of the new dragon and the mind of the new rider become completely open to each other and they become part of the other." He glanced over at the newly impressed hatchlings and their young riders. "It doesn't appear to have caused any harm but it is not something one should do."

Tia looked back at the others contritely. "I didn't really do it intentionally. Since I realized that I could talk to the dragons I have been leaving myself open to them and it just happened. I'm sorry if I overstepped."

Lessa nodded her head. "No harm done. Don't worry about it."

By the time they had reached the other side of the Gather area they saw the small black hatchling reach Tia's ship. He started scrabbling against the ship's hull as though trying to claw his way inside.

"This does not look good." F'lar commented as he looked over at Tia's avatar body then back at her ship where the actions of the black dragon were becoming more frantic.

Tia's face became stricken. "That poor thing. He is starting to get upset but there is no way that he can reach me and if he keeps that up he could hurt himself on my hull." Tia faced Lessa. "You can talk to all of the dragons can't you?"

Lessa was taken a bit off guard by the sudden question but she nodded. "Yes, normally I can."

Tia also nodded in return. "Try to talk to him." She pointed at the black hatchling. "See if you can get his attention."

Lessa looked back at Tia in surprise at getting such a request. Then she realized that Tia did not think like a Pernese. After a moment, Lessa reached out with her mind and tried to make contact with the little black hatchling. It took a couple of seconds for her to get through, but the black dragonet finally stopped trying to claw his way into Tia's ship. His head slewed around for a moment as though he was searching for something. Then he turned toward the approaching group and Tia clearly felt the hatchling reacting to Lessa's call to him. The black dragonet began making his way back toward them. Lessa could feel the black dragonet's desire to reach her but it was nothing like what she remembered feeling when she and Ramoth had impressed. That thought got her worrying about Ramoth and how she might feel about all this. What if that odd black dragon bonded to her?

A second later she felt Ramoth's reaction. "_I am not threatened by the little black one. He will not impress_."

'_Are you sure about that?_' Lessa inquired of her beloved queen dragon.

'_I am_.' The great golden dragon responded. Lessa looked up to see her golden queen emerge from the upper cavern entrance. Ramoth wheeled around and glided over to the outside ledge of her weyr where she landed and settled down to calmly watch the action out on the floor of the bowl.

The little black dragonet reached them and in her head Lessa received thoughts that she knew came from the black dragonet. Though not really using words as such she could easily understand what the young dragonet was trying to communicate. '_Who am I? What's my name?_' The voice in her head inquired.

The question caught Lessa completely by surprise. It was the last thing she had expected. '_You don't know your name? All dragons know their own name from the moment they hatch_.' Lessa responded to the hatchling.

A name just seemed to pop into Tia's mind. '_Markath, you are Markath._' She thought back at the little black dragon. The little dragons head swung around toward the ship and there was a sense of satisfaction radiating from the hatchling then it returned its attention to the small group. '_I am Markath_." He informed them happily as the sense of urgency seemed to melt away.

The next moment Markath the black dragon was looking up at them, his eyes scanning the group. Tia reached out to touch the little beast. Markath shied away from Tia's hand and hissed at her. Tia and Lessa could both feel the fear, uncertainty and distrust in the little dragon's mind.

Tia thought at him. '_Markath do not pull away. That is my avatar._' She also tried to project friendship and comfort at the same time.

The creature stopped backing away and looked over his shoulder at Tia's ship then back at Lessa. There was confusion in his mind. '_I do not understand._' He remarked plaintively.

Tia tried to explain. '_It is part of me just as your wing is part of you._'

'_There is nothing there. It is a dead thing_.' Markath complained, again looking distrustfully at the avatar.

Lessa jumped in at this point, unsure how much this hatchling could comprehend. '_Most of us reside in our own bodies, like you or me_.' The dragon's head shifted to Lessa as she continued. '_Tia however does not reside in her body. She resides in her ship and controls her body from there_.' To Lessa and Tia's surprise the hatchling actually seemed to grasp the concept Lessa was trying to get across.

Markath did not shy away this time when Tia approached him and allowed her to stroke his head. '_I'm hungry._' The little dragon complained.

Lessa smiled indulgently. "Now that sounds like a typical hatchling." She looked at Tia. "Do you think you could take our new friend here to be fed with the rest of the hatchlings over there?" She pointed to an area way over on the other side of the weyr floor where several of the other newly hatched dragons could be seen.

"I will go with you to help you get started." Offered Jaxom with a hint of a soft smile playing across his face.

"That would be fine with me." Tia responded. Then she addressed the black dragonet. '_Markath, will you go with my avatar?_'

The little dragonet glanced back and forth between Tia's ship and Tia's avatar body as he seemed to consider her question. Finally he responded. '_Yes, I will go with your avatar_.'

Tia nodded and she and Jaxom set out to join the other young dragons, followed closely by Markath. As they strolled to where the other young dragons were getting their first meal Tia began thinking about how Markath's communications skills were rapidly expanding. At first he had communicated using simple wordless concepts but now he was actually forming words and getting better at it all the time. She wondered if this was typical or was Markath exceptionally intelligent. She would have to ask Lessa or Jaxom about that later.

Soon as they arrived at the area where the new riders were chopping up large sides of raw meat and feeding it to their new dragons. Jaxom stepped in and showed Tia what to do. It was obvious that the dragons were strictly meat eaters. Though she had to cut the meat into much smaller pieces than the others, Markath managed to consume a surprisingly large amount of meat for his size. Once Jaxom was sure that Tia had it under control, he headed back to the gather area to join the others.

While she was feeding the little dragon Tia noticed several curious and some sympathetic looks from the other new dragonriders. A few even spoke to her. She learned the newly paired dragons and riders were referred to as weyrlings. Though she was very curious, Tia remembered what F'lar had told her and refrained from connecting to the minds of the other new dragons

While feeding Markath Tia began analyzing her own feelings toward the little dragon. There was no powerful intimate bond like the other dragon riders had formed. It wasn't even as intense as the much lesser bond that many of them had formed with their firelizards. In fact her feelings toward Markath were more maternal in nature and there was no bond involved. She got the impression that Lessa's feelings for the little black dragonet were very similar to her own but Lessa was very reluctant to become involved with Markath.

As the dragonets became sated they and their riders made their way back toward an area next to the celebrating crowd where proud family members and friends could congratulate the new future dragonriders and the riders could show off their new dragons. Though much smaller than the other hatchlings, Tia was sure that Markath had managed to eat nearly as much as they had.

As soon as Markath was sated he lumbered over to where Tia's ship sat, curled up against her hull and quickly fell asleep. Once Tia was sure that Markath was settled for the time being she headed back to the Gather area to find the others. She was a little worried about the little black dragon. What were they going to do about him?

~ o ~

"I have never seen anything like it." F'lar was saying. "Not only did he not impress, he didn't even seem to feel the need to impress." He shrugged. "I have no idea what is going to become of him."

Lessa responded to F'lar's comment with a shrug. "At least he's not sitting in the middle of the field keening away and disturbing the weyrlings like that pitiful green did in High Reaches Weyr six turns ago." A shudder went through her petite body. "Even some of our dragons here at Bendon were disturbed by it." She shook her head sadly. "I know how harsh it sounds but it was actually a relief when she finally died."

"Well it looks like there is no danger of that happening here." Jaxom remarked then a shudder passed through his frame. "Sometimes I think how terrible I would have felt if that had happened to Ruth. What if when I freed him from that too thick shell, he had not bonded with me? That could have been Ruth if he had not impressed."

Ruth's voice responded in Jaxom's mind. '_That did not happen. I am yours, you are mine, **we** are together_.'

Jaxom smiled in that soft special way reserved for Ruth and for Sharra as he responded to Ruth. '_Yes we **are** together and I will always be glad that I did what I did_.'

Sharra and Lessa had both heard Ruth's response to Jaxom and chuckled. Then Sharra put her arm around Jaxom's waist and commented. "Trust a dragon to get straight to the heart of the matter."

Sebell nodded as he absentmindedly stroked the head knobs of his little firelizard then commented. "Speaking of the heart of the matter, I wonder what will become of Markath."

**____****Continued in Part 14**

___( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and_'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	14. New Friends and Other Changes

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

**Chapter ************14 : New Friends and Other Change**s

Tia smiled as she rejoined the group of friends. "Markath has stuffed himself to the edge of exploding and is now sound asleep." She glanced around. "I see many of the new dragonriders are circulating among the crowd." At that point Tia noticed a deeply suntanned man accompanied by a slightly dazed looking tween boy approaching the tables. She recognized the boy as one of the candidates that had successfully impressed a new hatchling dragon.

Sebell waved the pair over to their table. "Master Talen!" He called out. "I haven't seen you since the last Gather at Fort Hold."

As the pair reached the table Lessa spoke. "Congratulations young T'cab to you and your bronze Radeth."

The boy blushed and drew himself just a bit taller at the use of his new contracted dragonrider name. "Good, ah, thank you Weyrwoman Lessa." He shuffled his feet. "Ah, good afternoon to all of you."

Sebell spoke up. "And I understand that congratulations are due you as well Master Talen." He turned to face the rest of the group. "Sailingmaster Talen had just received his captain's knots at the Fort Hold Gather fifteen days ago." He again faced Talen. "His ship is still under construction but I understand that she is a real beauty."

Talen nodded. "That she is Master Sebell." He smiled widely at the rest of those present. "The Shipmaster thinks that she will be the fastest merchant ship on the water. But it will be three more seven-days before she is ready to launch. Today is my son's and my daughter's day. Today they both became dragonriders."

F'lar nodded. "Yes that's right. Where is Talia?"

Talen responded. "She is around here somewhere with a group of other new dragonriders. She told me that she is going by T'ia now."

Lessa laughed. "That's very unusual. Most girls keep their original name when they become dragonriders. I have only known of one other female dragon rider that contracted her name."

Talen nodded. "Originally Talia had intended to keep her full name but she changed her mind this morning after hearing Menolly's ballad of Hypatia and Alexander." He glanced out toward the lake. "She told me that she had decided that if she impressed she would take the contraction in honor of Lady Starship Tia." He nodded toward Tia's ship. "So now she is known as T'ia."

Tia smiled warmly at the man. "I am honored Master Talen."

The man looked at Tia in confusion. "Aren't you the one that impressed that little black dragon?"

Tia responded. "Actually Markath did not impress. I have merely taken on the task of taking care of him for the time being. And I am also Hypatia and I am still sealed up inside my ship. This body is only an avatar that allows me the illusion of being able to walk among the rest of you."

Talen's eyebrows shot up. "Then the rumors I have heard about you are true. You can walk around in another's body."

Tia shook her head and laughed. "No, this is not another's body. It is a machine, a mechanical body that I am able to control directly with my mind."

Talen shook his head in disbelief. "But you look so alive."

Again Tia laughed. "It is a very well designed machine and it cost a small fortune to have it built for me."

Sebell remarked. "It is a difficult concept to grasp but it is the truth. The dragons and firelizards can sense her real presence and they know that she is inside her ship and there is no real life in this body. It confused them no end but the dragons caught on to the truth fairly easily once Tia explained it to them."

Talen nodded back at Sebell. "I thought the rumors I had heard were a bit farfetched yet the reality is even stranger." He nodded to Tia. "It has been a pleasure and an honor meeting you Lady Starship Hypatia." He nodded to the rest of them. "My best to the rest of you, and now I must take my leave. We have many friends to see during this celebration." He then turned and with his son headed into the crowd."

"A fine man and a fine family." Lord Groghe remarked as he watched the retreating pair. He then turned to Sebell and Menolly. "It seems that you still have a few mistaken ideas that need to be dispelled about . . ." He glanced at Tia. ". . . Lady Starship Tia." He grinned. "I like that title. It fits you."

Jaxom smiled with a hint of a twinkle in his eye. "I had already overheard that title spoken by others at this Gather and Groghe is right. Lady Starship Tia and Starship Master Alex fit you both perfectly."

If Tia could have blushed she would have. Alex however did not have that particular limitation.

~ o ~

A while later the musicians were once again entertaining the crowds. After a moving song about the joy of the newly impressed dragon and his dragonrider, they performed an old standard about the duty of a dragonrider to his dragon and to Pern. Next Menolly and Sebell took the stage. Menolly announced the Ballad of Lady Starship Hypatia and her companion Alexander. Tia noticed that other than the addition of her new title, the song also expanded and emphasized the section about the creation of her avatar body.

Tia marveled at Menolly's ability to create music on the fly. Sebell may have been bragging on his wife's ability but he had not been exaggerating.

The song was met with rousing cheers then the duo sang the firelizard song. Lord Groghe whispered to Tia that the song was a true story about how Menolly ended up impressing nine firelizards as a young girl.

After a couple more songs, Menolly and Sebell surrendered the stage to other musicians and the Gather was soon filled with smooth instrumental music. The group began to circulate through the Gather and Tia was soon fascinated with all the beautiful wares on display and for sale.

As they approached a booth that was festooned with dozens of drawings and paintings, Tia recognized the man behind the counter. She remembered noticing him staring intently at her that morning and slowed her steps to look more closely at him and the artwork. That was when she noticed a particular sketch hanging close to where the man was sitting. It was a drawing of her above the waist and behind her was pictured her ship at a forty-five degree angle. In the background was a quarter of a planet in the upper left corner that looked a lot like Pern. The rest of the background was dark speckled with a dozen stars. The drawing was very accurate and beautiful.

The man stood up as she approached. "Ah, Lady Starship, it is an honor to meet you." He noticed the direction of her gaze and took the drawing from where it was hanging. "You like my little drawing of you?"

Tia nodded. "It is very beautiful. I like the way you composed it with my avatar body superimposed over my starship body." She smiled at him. "I like it very much."

He extended the drawing toward her. "Then you should have it."

Tia shook her head. "I cannot take it. I have no money to pay you for it."

The man cocked his head. "Did I ask you for payment?" He shook his head. "What you have done for Pern would pay for my humble work a thousand times over." He extended the drawing closer. "I would be honored if you would accept this gift." There was a tone of half hopeful entreaty in his voice.

After a moment's hesitation Tia accepted the drawing. "It is a beautiful picture and it will occupy a prominent place in the control room of my ship. Thank you."

The man then wrapped the drawing for her to protect it while Tia and Alex looked at the other artwork he had on display. She noticed that a majority of it had a dragon theme. As the man handed her the wrapped drawing she responded. "Thank you very much. Ah, I did not get your name."

The man smiled at her and replied. "I am K'ran rider of Sonrath of Benden Weyr."

Tia's eyebrows shot up in surprise. She had not pegged the man as a dragonrider. "I'm glad to have met you."

~ o ~

It was late evening and most of the tents and stalls were being taken down and packed up as the Gather was closing down. Lessa turned to Alex and Tia. "We would like to invite you to stay for a while. Markath may not have impressed but it would be nice if you spent time with him just the same and we would enjoy your company."

Tia looked over at Alex as she sent a comlink message to him asking if he thought it would be a good idea. Then at his slight nod she responded. "We would like to spend some time in the Weyr."

Lessa smiled. "That is great. Benden is at capacity right now but I'm sure we can find a place for you."

Alex responded. "There is no need to worry about that. My quarters aboard Tia's ship are very comfortable."

Tia jumped in. "As for me, all I really need is a small place to store my avatar when I am not using it or when I am sleeping."

They made one more circuit of the rapidly disappearing gather then visited the weyr's kitchen to grab a late snack. They spent a while talking about the day until Jaxom and Sharra had to depart for Ruatha. Lord Groghe, Sebel, Menolly and a few of the harpers departed shortly after for Fort Hold.

A short time later those that remained in Benden Weyr were settling down for the night. Alex and Tia returned to the ship. Markath was still sleeping curled up against the hull of her ship. Tia left her avatar standing guard over him under the control of one of her AI computers. Alex went straight to his cabin and was soon sound asleep. After checking her ship's condition and reviewing the recordings of the day's events Tia adjusted her nutrient flow and was soon asleep as well. Though shell people did not need to rest, they did periodically spend a few hours a week dreaming in REM sleep which helped to keep the mind clear and sharp.

~ DRnBS ~

Tia was awakened from a dream of riding on the back of a dragon by waves of hunger coming from Markath. A quick scan of the area found several of the young weyrlings just outside of the weyrling cave feeding their young dragons. As she flushed the sleep from her real body with a shot of stimulant Tia took control of her avatar body.

Tia looked down to see Markath looking up at her, his compound eyes swirling with the red of hunger. She reached out and scratched a spot behind Markath's ear. "Come on, it looks like breakfast is served." She then started over to where the weyrlings were already feeding their dragons. Markath trotted along beside her crooning in anticipation. The two of them arrived at the area where the other dragonets were being fed by their new riders. They picked a spot among the others and Tia began feeding the meat to the little black dragon.

"Lady Starship Hypatia, how are you and your dragon doing this morning?" Came a voice to her left.

Tia looked up to see Sailingmaster Talen smiling back at her. Behind him she noticed Talen's two children busy feeding their own dragons. His son T'cab was concentrating on getting a large slab of meat into his bronze dragon Radeth's mouth. His daughter T'ia looked over from her green dragon Cornath and nodded to Tia. "It is a pleasure to meet you Lady Starship Hypatia."

Tia smiled back at her. "It is a pleasure meeting you Dragonrider T'ia. Your father told me about your choice of name and your reason. I am pleased at the honor you have bestowed upon me."

T'ia blushed and glanced at the ground. "I just hope I can live up to the name that I've taken."

Talen looked down at Markath. "Mighty unique fellow you have here." Then after a moment Talen looked up in surprise. "He said that he is hungry."

"Well then feed him." Tia responded, noticing that both T'ia and T'cab were looking at them in surprise.

"But he spoke to me." Talen remarked, his eyes showing a combination of uncertainty and wonder.

"It must mean that he likes you." Tia responded, handing him a chunk of meat.

Talen absent mindedly offered the raw meat to Markath who took it hungrily. Tia handed another piece of meat to Talen and took a step back as he fed the second piece to the apparently ravenous Markath. Meanwhile T'ia and T'cab were required by their hungry dragons to return their attention to their feeding duties. After a glance at Tia's face, Talen grabbed a third piece and fed it to Markath as his own uncertainty faded.

"I take it having Markath speaking to you is a bit unusual." Tia commented as she watched Talen feeding the little black dragon. She couldn't help being amused by the wonder that continued to suffuse Talen's features as, in her mind, she heard Markath requesting more food.

Talen shook his head as he glanced up at Tia. "Dragons normally will only communicate with their rider or with people like Weyrwoman Lessa that can hear all dragons."

Tia cocked her head and shrugged. "From what you said, I take it that my ability to speak with all the dragons is a rare talent."

Talen and both his children looked at Tia in surprise as Talen responded. "I have only heard of three people on Pern with that ability."

Tia nodded. "How very interesting." She had gotten the impression that being able to talk to all the dragons was not common but she had not realized how rare it really was.

As Tia observed Talen feeding Markath, she talked to him and his two children about the bond between dragons and their riders. It was a fascinating conversation.

**____****Continued in Part 15**

___( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and_'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	15. Lessons and Questions

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

**_A/N: _**_Sorry for the long delay. It seems that life just keeps getting in the way. I hope get the next chapter up quicker._******  
**

* * *

**Chapter ************15 : ****Lessons and Questions**  


When the young dragons had all been fed, the Weyrlingmaster called his young charges with their dragons over to the classroom area. Talen joined Tia and Markath as they followed the other new riders and dragons. The Weyrlingmaster gathered his charges in a semicircle and began his instruction.

"For most of you . . ." He cast a quick glance over at Tia and cleared his throat. ". . . most of what we discuss today will not be that new to you, but that is no excuse to not be attentive in this class. Today will be the first day of what will be the most important part of your life. Most of you are just beginning to really understand the true strength and intensity of the bond between dragon and dragonrider. The relationship between you and your dragon is **vital** to the wellbeing of both you and your dragon. Since yesterday's impression your dragon has become as much a part of you as your heart or your lungs, and you have become just as much a part of your dragon. You do not want to make a mistake that will cause the loss of your dragon because you didn't pay attention in class."

He glanced around to be sure that he had everyone's attention. "Now as you all should know, ninety percent of a dragon's growth happens during the first year of its life. That type of extremely rapid growth puts a lot of stress on a young dragon's hide. For that reason, the hide must be kept well oiled to keep it strong and elastic." He again swept his charges with his most serious glare. "Ruptures in the hide of a dragon can seriously interfere with its mobility and they can be fatal when jumping between. Now let's begin with the proper way to oil a dragon's hide."

He told his young charges to each take one of the small oil pots that had been conveniently set out for the students and he then began instructing them in the proper way to attend to their dragon's skin. He used T'cab's bronze Radeth as an example to show them how to properly apply the oil and how to rub it in until the hide showed a warm soft satin sheen. He pointed out how too little oil left the hide a bit duller leaving it vulnerable to ruptures, and he explained how too much oil left the hide slick shiny and messy.

Once the weyrlingmaster finished his demonstration and set the young future dragonriders to their task, he then wandered among his students examining their work and pointing out any places where their efforts had been less than perfect. He was very exacting in his expectations and got very sharp with any that he thought were slacking off in their task.

Sailingmaster Talen watched Tia tending to Markath for a few minutes then expressed an interest in helping. "This may sound foolish but I have always been fascinated by dragons and I am especially intrigued by your little black. Would you mind if I tried helping to oil him . . . sort of get a feel for myself what it is like?"

Tia and Markath both looked over at Talen for a moment. Tia felt Markath's understanding and replied. "I would welcome the help." At the same time Talen heard Markath in his head respond. '_Yes, please help_.'

Markath's direct response had surprised him. After a startled moment, Talen grabbed an available oil pot and, with Tia's further encouragement, joined in. Markath's eyes closed and he soon crooned in pleasure as both of them rubbed the oil into his jet black hide.

The weyrlingmaster stood by a few minutes observing Tia and Talen industriously rubbing the oil into Markath's hide. There was a speculative frown on his face then, without a word, he moved on to the next student.

Tia was working on Markath's left shoulder wing joint and Talen was working on the right one when she glanced around, noticing that they were, not too surprisingly, much further along on their task that the other students. She then looked up at Talon. "How often does this have to be done?" She asked him quietly.

Talen shrugged his shoulders while shaking his head in response.

Tia was startled by the weyrlingmaster's voice coming from directly behind her. "Students, Tia has just asked a very important question." He stepped past her and continued moving among his students. "Who can tell me how often you need to oil your dragon's hide?"

T'cab was the first to respond. "During the first year it should be after each meal." He puffed up with pride and grinned at his father.

"Good start but your answer is incomplete." The Weyrlingmaster remarked, causing T'cab to instantly deflate. "Anyone else know what he left out?"

T'ia grinned at her brother as she responded. "You must also oil any flaky patches that appear on your dragon's hide as soon as possible.".

The weyrlingmaster nodded at T'ia. "That is correct." He raised his voice. "A flaky patch indicates that the skin is too dry. Dry skin becomes brittle, and brittle skin can split when stressed. Such a rupture can be very painful and distracting to the dragon. It can also be fatal if it happens while your dragon is jumping between."

The weyrlingmaster continued instructing the students as he wandered among them inspecting their progress. As the lesson preceded, Talen continued to help Tia while listening to everything the weyrlingmaster told them about how to care for a dragon. Talen had figured that since he was at loose ends until his ship was ready to launch, he might as well spend the time at the weyr with his two children and learn as much as he could about their new lives. He also was fascinated by the most unusual black dragon, Markath, and by the equally unusual Lady Starship Hypatia. The two of them were such a strange anomaly and he wanted to know more about both of them.

Just about when they finished oiling Markath, Alex came strolling up to join Talen and Tia. He glanced down at the small dragonet and frowned. "Is it my imagination or has he actually gotten bigger overnight?"

Tia nodded. "It isn't your imagination. All of the hatchlings are growing at a phenomenal rate and Markath seems to be growing at a rate that is about sixty-five percent greater than the other dragons."

"Does that mean that he will eventually be as large as the other dragons?" Alex asked.

Tia shook her head. "I have no way of knowing."

They were all startled when the weyrlingmaster spoke up from behind them. "There is no way to tell at this point how big he will get. Ruth grew faster than the other dragons for the first week but he still ended up being much smaller than the other dragons." He reached out and rubbed the top of Markath's head. "And this fella has even less in common with the other dragons than Ruth did." He smiled encouragingly at Tia. "We'll just have to wait and see how he develops." He nodded to them then continued to move about among the dragonet's and their young riders giving out encouragement and admonishment almost at random."

After a couple of moments Tia spoke. "Does he always sneak up on people like that?"

Alex and Talen both shrugged then they were again startled by another voice from behind. "Old C'ran has always been like that ever since he became C'ran." They turned to see F'lar approaching them holding a cup of some steaming dark liquid. He took a sip then continued with a hint of a chuckle. "It really keeps his student's on their toes." He looked down at the small black dragon and rubbed Markath's head along one eye ridge. "And how are you doing this morning Markath?"

F'lar was startled when he clearly heard the little black dragon's response in his head. '_I am fine thank-you_.'

F'lar stared a moment at the little black dragon then looked at Tia. "He spoke directly to me. For as far back as I can remember newly hatched dragons have always only talked with the rider that they impressed." He looked back down at Markath. "And this fellow has a surprisingly large vocabulary for being only a day old."

Tia responded. "As near as I can tell, Markath has not formed any impression type link with me or anyone else, at least nothing like the other dragons. He seems to have formed a bond of friendship with myself and Talen but he has not impressed nor does he seem to require such a bond the way the other hatchlings did."

All four present were surprised by Markath's voice in their heads. '_I have friends, what more could I want? I am tired. I will go rest now._' The little black dragon then started off toward where Tia's ship sat near the lake.

The four of them watched the little black dragon as he ambled over to Tia's ship and settled down against the ship's side. Within a half minute he was asleep. Tia looked at F'lar then glanced over at the other students as one by one their dragons were approved by the Weyrlingmaster and they headed off to the weyrlings cavern with an admonishment to return as soon as their dragons were settled.

C'ran came up to Tia's little group and addressed F'lar. "This is as fine a batch of dragons and dragonriders as I have seen." He glanced out to where the starship sat with the tiny black shape up against its side. "Even that odd little black is showing some unusually interesting characteristics." He glanced at Tia. "He even talked to me once during class. Surprised me . . . asked me why he didn't impress like the others." He again glanced out where Markath lay. "Amazingly intelligent for a dragon . . . especially for one so young." He glanced over at the weyrling cavern. "Ah, here comes the rest of my class." Soon he was busy getting the young riders situated.

As class continued C'ran discussed several different aspects of caring for a dragon. To everyone's surprise, F'lar settled in with the rest of the students and listened attentively to the instructor. Even Alex found the lesson to be quite interesting.

At one point Talen noticed the way Alex held Tia's hand and the way Alex and Tia sort of leaned into one another. He found himself thinking that her body may be no more than a very sophisticated machine but he would be hard pressed to not think of her as a living person. He wondered what it might be like from her viewpoint. Talen was drawn back to the lesson when C'ran asked a question of T'ia who was sitting right next to him.

~ o ~

C'ran's gaze swept his group of students for a moment then he spoke. "It's time for lunch. Class is dismissed." As everyone stirred he held his hands up for attention. "Everyone must be back here two hours before dinnertime to feed and oil your dragons." He looked around to be sure everyone had heard. "Now get out of here."

As the students scattered, Talen and his two children headed off across the weyr bowl leaving Tia, Alex and F'lar on their own. Tia glanced out at her ship. "How long is he going to be just eating and sleeping like that?"

F'lar responded. "It's hard to say with a dragon as unique as Markath, but normally this stage lasts for the first two seven-days or so while the dragon normally will more than triple in size. For Ruth it only lasted about nine days." F'lar looked toward the other side of the Benden Weyr bowl where tables and benches were being set up. "The weather is so nice today that they are planning to serve lunch outside." He glanced at Tia and Alex. "I'm hungry. Let's go grab some lunch." He set off in that direction with Alex and Tia right behind him.

Just before they reached the tables Tia became aware of a new presence and looked up just as Ruth appeared with Jaxom and Sharra on his back. Ruth dropped suddenly only to pull out at the last second to make a nice soft landing just a few yards from F'lar, Alex and Tia's position with barely a whisper of dust being kicked up. Ruth looked over at Alex projecting a very smug air as Jaxom and Sharra quickly dismounted. Both of them were laughing.

Tia turned to Alex with a big grin on her face. "Apparently, Ruth felt a bit challenged by your display of flying skill on the grav-sled and he wanted to show that he can land just as well as you can."

Ruth glanced over at where Tia's ship sat then leaped into the air. This time he did kick up a fair amount of dust with the first powerful down stroke of his wings. He flew up to the Benden Weyr crater rim and settle down among the other dragons that were up there sunning themselves.

Jaxom and Sharra were still laughing as they walked up. "Lord Jaxom, Lady Sharra, Welcome to Benden." F'lar greeted them. "You're just in time to join us for lunch." He jerked his head once toward the tables.

"We would be happy to have lunch with you." Sharra replied.

The five of them approached the group of tables then adjusted course when they spotted Lessa directing the placing of the platters of food. Once Lessa was satisfied with the setup she joined them as the rest of the weyr's compliment of people began converging on the large collection of tables.

Lessa addressed Jaxom and Sharra, again welcoming them to Benden Weyr then they all sat down just as Talon, T'cab and T'ia were approaching the tables. Tia called them over and at Lessa's invitation they joined them at their table. T'cab and T'ia were both just a bit overwhelmed to be invited to sit with such important people. At a word from F'lar they all began digging into the food.

After a few moments of silence, as everyone began their meal, Lessa spoke to Jaxom. "Ruth informs me that you had a bit of excitement at Ruatha yesterday." She gazed at him expectantly.

Everyone's attention was immediately focused on Jaxom, all curious about what Lessa was referring to.

After a moment to swallow Jaxom responded. "It seems that yesterday a group of 'abominators' were caught trying to sneak onto Ruathan land. They were in a wagon disguised as traders. One of my rangers saw them and thought there was something strange about them so he stopped them to check them out. They attacked my ranger but some of my field hands that were working nearby saw what was happening and came to the ranger's aid. The wagon turned out to be loaded with explosives. Apparently they had planned to blow up Tia's ship. They didn't realize that she was no longer located at Ruatha."

Talen spoke up looking a bit disturbed. "I thought all the 'abominators' had been banished turns ago."

Lessa responded in disgust. "They're like tunnel snakes. You can't see them but they're there."

"What did you do with them?" Talen asked.

"My people took their explosives and their wagon then escorted them to the edge of Ruathan land." Jaxom replied. "A runner was sent to keep an eye on them from a distance to make sure that they didn't try to return."

"What exactly is an 'abominator'?" Tia asked.

Jaxom answered her. "The 'abominators' are a small group of people that consider anything out of what they consider normal to be an abomination and must be destroyed. They are foolish small minded but dangerous people." He shrugged. "We try to keep an eye on any that we uncover and stop them from damaging any of our developing technology. If one of them is caught damaging some of our scarce technology they are banished to one of the hundreds of uncharted eastern islands."

**____****Continued in Part 16**

___( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and_'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	16. The Project

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

**_A/N:_**_ Again, sorry for the long delay. As before, life just keeps getting in the way of all my carefully laid plans._******  
**

* * *

**Chapter ************16 : ********The Project**  


Tia was absorbing what Jaxom had told her about the abominators when a very disturbing thought occurred to her. She glanced toward her ship, where the little black dragon was currently curled up against her hull sound asleep, then looked worriedly back at Jaxom. "What about Markath? Does that mean that these . . . 'abominators' . . . will try to kill him?" She was a bit surprised at how much the thought disturbed her. "Is he in danger?" She glanced again toward her ship then looked up where Ruth was perched along the rim wondering if Ruth was also in danger. She again looked at Jaxom for an answer.

Jaxom also glanced toward her starship. He had seen the little black curled up in sleep as they had flown in. He looked back at her and shook his head. "No . . . No, they never showed any interest in Ruth so I don't think Markath is in any danger." He paused in thought as he looked speculatively at her before he continued. "You, however, Lady Starship Tia, I think are definitely in danger, both as your ship and as this mechanical body. It is advanced technology and anything that results from it that they hate. More precisely, it's anything to do with intelligent machines and whatever might come from them that those people hate." He smiled with a shrug. "However I have no doubt that you are more than able to protect yourself in either of your very remarkable incarnations."

Tia smiled back at Jaxom. "Thank-you for that kind complement and it is a relief to know that Markath is safe." She glanced out toward the ship and her smile softened. "Markath and I may not have impressed or linked or whatever you call it, but I find that I'm very fond of the little guy and I would be devastated if anything happened to him." She sighed deeply wondering what she was going to do about that little dragon. She had become very attached to him but she would be leaving Pern before too long.

Alex had been watching Tia as she spoke. He had noticed how attached she had become to that little black dragon and it worried him just a bit. Then she sighed and a wistful contemplative expression crossed her face. He found himself marveling once again at how much of her personality came through when she was fully linked to her avatar body. She looked, acted and even felt like a real living person. At this moment this simulacrum was her, the living girl he was in love with. He was reminded of a very old saying. '_A difference that makes no difference **is** no difference._' He didn't remember where that line had come from but in this case it rang true.

After a moment Alex snapped back and decided that the table conversation, and his own thoughts, had become a bit too serious and decided that a change of subject was in order. "Tell me Lord Jaxom, what is it that brings you to Benden Weyr this morning?" He then put a bite in his mouth and looked back at Jaxom expectantly.

Jaxom glanced over at Talen a moment then with another shrug responded. "I am working with F'lar and some of the other weyrleaders on a special . . ." He again glanced at Talon. ". . . **And secret** project."

Jaxom and F'lar stared at each other as though waiting for the other to make a decision. Lessa was glancing back and forth between the two of them. Because of Tia's, 'unique', ability to hear all of the dragons, she knew that the three of them were communicating through their dragons. The gist of the short discussion was to decide just how much they should say about the project in front of everyone currently sitting at their table.

Lessa, F'lar and Jaxom all felt that Alex and Tia could be trusted. Lessa proclaimed that T'ia and T'cab were both dragonriders now and knew where their loyalties lay. The only question was Talon. That was settled by Ruth when he stated that Markath liked Talen and that meant that he was trustworthy. Tia had to work very hard to suppress a giggle at the tone of Ruth's mental voice when he made that pronouncement. She noticed however that Lessa and Jaxom were not quite so successful at suppressing their own grins.

The whole silent discussion took less than a minute then at a nod from all three, F'lar took over the explanation. He first glanced around at their immediate area to verify that their table was sufficiently isolated to prevent being easily overheard. He addressed his comments toward Tia and Alex but it was made clear by his attitude and a look he gave them that Talen and his two children were, as of this moment, being officially brought into whatever conspiracy Jaxom, F'lar and Lessa were involved in. "To explain what we are doing you would have to know about the meteor." As he paused Tia saw recognition mixed with a hint of sadness in the eyes of Talon, T'ia and T'cab. F'lar continued. "Five turns ago a rather sizable meteor hit the sea of Pern. As you know, with the exception of the two main continents Pern is mostly one great ocean. The tidal wave created circled the entire planet causing a tremendous amount of devastation along all the coastal areas."

"That must have been a terrible disaster." Tia remarked. She had a very accurate map of Pern in her databanks and could easily see what would have happened. The probability of a meteor strike on Pern hitting the water was extremely high and there was no costal area that would not be inundated by the resultant tidal wave. She noticed an increase in the look of loss bordering on pain in the faces of Talen and both his children making her wonder what they must have lost in that disaster.

After a short pause to let the magnitude of the disaster sink in, F'lar continued. "Immediately after that, the weyrs worked together to build a string of several observatories around the planet to allow us to find and map any other large asteroids that might threaten Pern. With two rather large asteroid belts and one fair sized rogue planet on a long elliptical orbit, there is no shortage of likely candidates. Wanser, our Starmaster finds it amazing that we have not been hit before in the last two and a half thousand turns of our recorded history. That last threadfall two days ago is a perfect illustration of the seriousness of the problem. Lady Starship Tia, if you had not stepped in and helped by sweeping away all the meteors that were mixed in with that wave of thread it would have turned into a major disaster far worse than the one five years ago."

Alex frowned and inquired. "What you're describing sounds like only a partial stopgap measure at best."

F'lar glanced at Talen then responded. "That is true. The creation of the observatories pacified the Lord Holders and the general population but as you pointed out it is not really a satisfactory solution. It is a very big sky out there and even with all of the observatories being fully staffed and in constant operation the odds of actually spotting the next one to hit us is not that good."

The look of surprise and disillusionment on the faces of Talen and his children was very instructive to Tia and Alex. Obviously up until this moment they had fully believed in the effectiveness of the observatory program.

F'lar continued. "For the observatories to really do their job effectively they have to know where to look." Again he paused looking at Jaxom.

Jaxom took up the explanation. "The Yokohama, that's the largest of the three transport ships in orbit, has a functional asteroid mass detector but it is only able to detect objects that are directly in its path when the ship is underway."

Alex interrupted. "But there is also a scanner system on that ship that scans in all directions. I know because it scanned us when we were approaching Pern."

Jaxom nodded. "That is true and that is how I knew of your approach, but that system only reacts to space craft under power or asteroids with a particularly high metal content. Most of the asteroids in this system are more rock and ice than metal. Only the largest asteroids would be likely to set off the Yokohama's detectors."

This time Tia responded. "So what is this secret project that you mentioned?"

Jaxom continued. "We removed the mass detector from the Baharain, it had been deactivated but it was still functional, and brought it to Benden. We disassembled it to learn how it worked and then we built a duplicate mass scanner that operated over a wider nearly hemispherical area. That part of the project took nearly four turns to be successfully completed.

Now we are in the process of trying to build six satellites. The wide angle scanner is very sensitive to the presence of any reasonable mass within twenty million kilometers over the entire horizon to horizon hemispherical arc. The one thing that the scanners cannot give us is the velocity vectors of the mass but it can tell our observatories where to look. The idea is that these satellites would be able to continuously scan the entire sky of Pern for any approaching mass large enough to be a threat. The location of any object they spotted would be passed on to the observatories where the object could be tracked and its course accurately analyzed to determine if it will hit Pern."

Again Alex interrupted. "So if you spot another asteroid about to hit, you can evacuate the coastal areas."

"No." F'lar shook his head. "If an asteroid turns out to be a danger to Pern then the dragons will intercept it and move it."

Alex and Tia both looked at F'lar like he had just grown another head. "What?" They both exclaimed simultaneously.

Jaxom chuckled. "F'lar is not addled; he is dead serious. Among the various 'talents' of the dragons is the ability to push objects. It is called 'telekinesis'. If you get enough dragons working together they could push a fairly sizable asteroid off its course. Two turns ago, in an experiment to test our theory, twenty dragons working together were able to significantly shift the course of an asteroid that was three times the size of the mountain that this weyr occupies."

Tia and Alex stared at Jaxom in stunned silence. The implications of that feat were staggering.

After a second Jaxom continued. "The one stumbling block to this plan is the satellites themselves. We have managed to complete two of them but that is as far as we can go at present. We have only been able to locate enough power supplies for those two satellites. We have been trying to duplicate those power supplies but have had no success so far. At one point we tried to power them with solar panels, we know how to build those, but they just do not generate enough power to operate the satellite. The mass scanner takes a lot of power to get the range, dispersion and sensitivity that we need for them to be effective. It would take a solar battery with the area of over three thousand square feet to generate enough power to run them continuously. On top of that there is the problem of getting the satellites properly placed in their orbits. The dragons can carry them into space easily enough but how to place them precisely enough is a problem. We can calculate the exact coordinates where they should be placed in orbit but those numbers are meaningless to the dragons."

The entire compliment of that table sank into a discouraged silence as they all contemplated the difficulties involved in the satellite project.

Eventually it was Tia that broke the silence. "If you were to show us what you have so far there is a possibility that Alex and I might be able to help you out."

Now it was Jaxom, F'lar and Lessa's turn to look on with stunned surprise. It was Sharra the asked the question. "Do you really think that you can help?"

Tia replied. "As far as getting the satellites precisely placed in orbit, that is child's play for me. I am, above all else, a rather sophisticated starship after all. As for your power supply problem, that depends on what type of power supplies you have now. I think I may have what you need but I would have to see your designs to be sure if the type of portable power supplies I have available will work." She glanced around at the plates of uneaten food then continued. "Why don't you finish your lunches and then we will see what we can do."

~ o ~

Tia and Alex stared around the large workspace deep inside the walls of Benden Weyr. There were a dozen work stations with various electronic assemblies scattered around the chamber. In the center of the room was a very large table covered with charts, diagrams, schematics and pages of mathematical formulas.

On the far wall were two cylindrical objects. They were about a meter in diameter and two meters tall. The first thought that went through Tia's mind when she saw them was that they were very close to the size and shape of the titanium shell that contained her own living body. She shook off the momentary reaction to their disturbingly familiar appearance.

The bottom of each cylinder was flat. The top of each cylinder ended in a hemispherical dome. The cylinders were almost totally featureless except for a parabolic antenna folded against the curved side and, incongruently, six large handles evenly spaced around the center.

Next to the two apparently completed cylinders sat four large open cylindrical frameworks partially filled with electronics in various degrees of completion. The bottom third of the open frameworks was completely empty. Tia suspected that the open space was meant to hold the power supply. Tia walked up to one of the incomplete cylinders that appeared to have the greater amount of installed electronics, and examined it carefully.

Everything Tia saw was being stored in her main database while she set one of her IA's to analyzing the data. She paid close attention to the open connection in the large empty portion of the framework. The AI did indeed identify that connection as the power input point. She looked a bit more closely at one spot in the framework and frowned. The analysis she got back from the AI also included a couple of results that made Tia's frown deepen.

Tia backed up from her examination and turned to face F'lar. "Do you have a schematic of the satellites that I could examine? I need to check a few things out first before I can be sure that I will be able to help."

F'lar cocked his head, a look combining hope and curiosity on his face. "Yes, I have the drawings right over here." He indicated the large table that was covered with drawings. As Tia approached F'lar began shuffling through the stacks and pulled out the necessary drawings.

Tia looked down and quickly flipped through the seven pages of schematics. Each drawing was uploaded into her database to be analyzed as fast as she could flip through them. By the time she had glanced at all seven sheets, her AI had returned a complete analysis of all of the satellites' systems. Her frown had not gone away as she again faced F'lar and Jaxom. "Would it be alright if I opened one of the completed satellites to examine the power cell?"

F'lar and Jaxom looked at each other, now they too were sporting worried and uncertain expressions. Finally with a half-hearted look on his face F'lar responded. "Sure I think that can be allowed."

Jaxom grabbed some tools off of one of the workbenches and went about removing a large panel that took up the bottom third of the satellite and extended halfway around the cylinder. Once it was off Tia was on her knees closely examining a solid looking round assembly that completely filled the cavity that it was mounted in.

After a quick examination of the power cell Tia nodded as she mumbled to herself. "That's what I was afraid of." She dusted herself off then spoke to F'lar and Jaxom. "These satellites will not be able to do the job they were designed to do."

**____****Continued in Part 17**

___( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and_'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	17. Revisions and Solutions

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

**_A/N:_**_ At last, this chapter is finally done despite all of the upheaval that has been going on around me. I hope future chapters will be finished more quickly._******  
**

* * *

**Chapter ************17 : ****Revisions and Solutions**  


For several moments there was only stunned silence as the others processed Tia's statement. They had all worked so hard for nearly four years on the satellite project. It was supposed to be the key to the dragonriders' goal of protecting Pern from all of the possible dangers from space. Now Tia had shot down their great plan. She had spent just a half an hour looking over the four partially constructed satellites and the two completed satellites and glanced through the schematic drawings, then she had flatly asserted that the detector satellites would not work.

Finally the silence was broken. "What do you mean?" Jaxom, F'lar and Lessa all asked simultaneously.

F'lar pointed to the two completed satellites. "We even transported one of those two into orbit for a test run and it worked perfectly."

Tia shook her head. "What I should have said is that they will not be able to do the job they were designed to do for very long." She approached one of the unfinished satellites. "See that power converter?" She was pointing to a black object that was about three inches by four inches by two inches and had black vanes sticking out from three sides. "That power converter is very 'very' old, and it was designed to operate in an atmosphere environment. Nearly five percent of the power going through that device is converted to heat. Those vanes draw away the excess heat generated by the converter by releasing it into a constant airflow that should be passing through them. Without the constant airflow the heat transfer will be reduced to a trickle of radiated heat. At the power level that you will be operating them at, they will burn out within less than a full turn."

Tia then pointed to a long fat rod that connected to the bottom center of the top dome assembly. "See that transducer? It will also be operating at a level way above its rated capacity. Surprisingly, that device can actually handle that large of a load indefinitely but at that level it radiates a lot of electromagnetic force. Constant exposure to that much EMF will eventually damage some of the more delicate components in the satellite. This will case a slow degradation of the satellites functionality until the eventual catastrophic failure within three turns."

Tia paused with a sigh. "And there is the Power supply problem. I pulled the construction requirements on those power cells from my data archive. Pern simply does not have the technology nor the raw materials required to build them. In my research of the records on the Yokohama I found out that one of the reasons this planet was chosen by your ancestors was because of its lack of any natural resources that have strategic value. One of those missing resources is a major ingredient in those power cells."

Everyone in the room looked totally crestfallen as they absorbed what she was telling them. Jaxom shook his head as his shoulders slumped. "So what you're saying is that the project is doomed to fail."

Tia could see the signs of defeat in the faces and posture of the others in the room with her. Even Alex looked extremely disappointed. Tia shook her head and continued. "Not necessarily."

Bowed heads snapped up and Tia now had the full attention of everyone in the room. "What do you mean?" Lessa asked, a spark of hope in her eyes.

Tia smiled and continued. "Just before Alex and I embarked on our current assignment I had a small fully automated universal machine shop installed in my ship. I can manufacture heavy metal cylindrical shields that will fit over the transducers and, hopefully, protect the rest of the satellite's circuitry from the transducer's electro-magnetic pulses." She cocked her head and gestured toward the table with all the drawings. "The power converter overheat problem can be fixed by attaching the same type of solid state thermal transfer units that you are already using to cool the satellite's processor chips. It's not a very elegant or ideal solution but it will work and it will make the satellites operate reliably for centuries."

"What about the lack of suitable power supplies?" F'lar asked touching on the one problem that had been plaguing them for four years. He saw no solution to that particular difficulty unless Tia could somehow come up with four more of the ancient power-supply cells.

"I think I have the solution to that problem as well." Tia responded. "My shell that my real body is encased in is almost exactly the same size and shape as one of those satellites and those power cells are almost identical to the type that is used to power my shell. I have a few extras packed in my cargo compartment. I could let you have them for your satellites."

Lessa shook her head. "Don't you need those? Wouldn't you die if you lost power to your shell?"

Tia shook her head. "That is extremely unlikely to happen. Those power cells have a normal operating lifespan of two-million hours. That is equal to over two hundred years of continuous use. And they are nearly a hundred percent reliable. Also since the day that I was installed in my ship my power is supplied by the ship. The power cell now serves only as an emergency backup. If I keep one of the spare cells as an emergency replacement, that still leaves five that I can give you for your satellites. That gives you enough for all six satellites with one spare left over just in case."

The looks on everyone's faces clearly showed how much they appreciated Tia's generous offer. "I don't know how we could possibly thank you for all you are doing for Pern." Lessa remarked.

"It is nothing. We're happy to be of some help." Tia replied. "This is an amazing world that you have carved out of an extremely hostile environment and deserves to be protected. The wonderful hospitality that everyone has shown Alex and me are thanks enough."

~ o ~

Several hours later they were deep in discussion over the best way to retrofit the satellites with Tia's suggested modifications. F'lar and Jaxom were cutting the vanes off of the power converters and attaching the new heat exchangers to them. Tia had set her automated machine shop to milling out a dozen different size cylinders to test with the main transducer. Alex had just returned from the ship with the test cylinders. The first two that they had tried had not worked. The first one had not supplied sufficient shielding. The second one had been too thick and wouldn't fit into the available space. The third just barely fit but still didn't quite provide enough shielding.

Jaxom studied the space where the transducer was located for a while then looked at the one that had been just about ten millimeters too thick. Finally he looked at the others. "What if we reposition this modulation module away from the transducer as far as it will go and cut a five millimeter groove into this shield cylinder to clear the edge of the first stage detector module? That might still leave enough shielding to protect the circuits."

After a few minutes of discussion they decided to try it. Jaxom spent the next twenty minutes filing the groove into the cylinder while the rest worked on relocating the modulation module.

They were in the process of fitting the modified shield prototype over the transducer when Tia and Talen both looked up. "Markath is awake and hungry." Tia announced as she set the tool she had been using down. "I had better go feed him." T'ia and T'cab were already on their way out to the feeding area.

Talen placed a hand on her shoulder. "Your knowledge and skills are necessary right here and I am not of much use. I would be happy to feed Markath for you while you continue working here."

Tia looked at him for a moment then nodded. "I would very much appreciate your assistance with Markath and I know that he wouldn't mind." She smiled. "Thank-you for your help."

Talen headed out of the chamber just behind his two children. Tia smiled at their retreating backs. She really liked that whole family. After they disappeared through the far doorway Tia returned to the job of testing the fit of the latest version of a shield over the transducer using one of the incomplete satellites.

The newest shield fit perfectly and a quick check showed that the new arrangement would not interfere with the function of the surrounding components. Tia instructed the AI controlling the automated machine shop on her ship to make five more like the one she had just mounted.

Tia had all of the outer panels removed from one of the completed satellites then Jaxom, F'lar and Tia began duplicating the modifications on that satellite.

~ o ~

Talen had finished feeding Markath and the little black dragon was again curled up on the ground next to Tia's ship. Talen looked up to see Alex approaching.

Alex glanced down at the little black dragon then commented. "All finished I see."

Talen nodded. "That's about all he does is eat, sleep and grow."

Alex shrugged, a bit of a frown creasing his forehead. He looked up at the bulk of their spaceship then back down at the sleeping black dragon. "I wonder just how big he will eventually become."

Talen shook his head. "At this point I don't think anyone can say for sure."

Alex shrugged and shook his head then he looked at Talon. "Well, if you're free at the moment then I could use a little help."

"Whatever I can do." Talen responded.

Alex nodded his head toward the main hatch. "Good, then you can help me bring back those extra power cells." He started toward the hatch with Talen following eagerly behind.

As they entered the ship Talen was looking around in wide-eyed wonder. He had seen the inside of one of the unearthed shuttles back at Landing on the southern continent but that had been little more than a gutted hulk and the inside of Tia's ship was so much more functional and impressive. They entered a large room that was filled with racks of mostly incomprehensible objects. Alex went over to one corner and pulled out a two meter long by one meter wide platform from its niche in the wall. Once pulled free it floated about a meter from the floor. He pulled the floating platform over to one of the racks that contain six roughly disk shaped objects that were just under a meter in diameter and a half meter thick.

He indicated the fat power cell disks. "I'll need your help to shift these onto the hover-cart. While I operate the loading servo manually I need you to help guide the load onto the hover-cart."

"I'll do the best I can." Talen responded.

Once the first cell was successfully loaded onto the hover-cart Talen commented. "This system seems to be very inefficient."

Alex shook his head and responded. "Normally Tia would just use one of her servos to move these without any help from me but all of her attention is tied up right now on whatever they are doing to those satellites. Since I don't have direct links to all the sensor and servo systems we have to do this the hard way." The power cells were a lot heavier than they looked but the two of them were able to get five of them onto the hover-cart.

That left one still sitting on the rack. Talen glanced at that one remaining power cell then looked at Alex a hint of uncertainty and concern in his expression. "Are you sure having only one backup left won't cause a problem?"

Alex looked into his eyes then shook his head. "The power cell inside her shell **is** the backup and the only time she has had to use it was when she was transferred from her original ship to this ship, just before we began our current mission. That power cell is good for a couple of hundred years and she has only put about four years on it while she was in the lab schools learning to be a brainship."

Alex paused as he received a message that the five other RF shields had been completed. He went up to the small automated machine shop to retrieve the newly made parts.

Upon his return Alex nodded toward the loaded hover-cart. "Come on, let's get these back to the workshop before Tia comes looking for us."

~ o ~

Alex and Talen soon returned with the five modern power cells. With a little minor modification they were able to fit one of the modern power cells into the one completed satellite that already had all of the other proposed modifications installed. After one last check of their work all of the outer panels were reattached to that modified satellite.

Everyone in the workshop held their breath as Jaxom pressed the key on the testing computer. The circuitry came to life. F'lar and Tia quickly scanned the test instruments. All of the indications on the control computer and the test equipment showed normal operation. More importantly, the radiation detector showed barely a flicker. It was well below the safety margin for the rest of the circuitry. A general cheer went up as F'lar announced the results.

They now had everything they needed to finish all six satellites. The test satellite was shut down and the room was full of good cheer as they planned the next steps in the project.

~ o ~

During a break Alex found Tia leaning against a wall in a hallway near the satellite workshop apparently lost in thought. She didn't seem aware of his approach. "What is it that has you so distracted, Tia?" He inquired.

She blinked twice as she appeared to come out of a deep mental fog then looked up at him, a frown of concern on her face. "Alex, I'm torn." She stood away from the wall. "We will have to be leaving Pern very soon." She placed her hand on his chest as though to draw comfort from the contact as she looked up into his eyes. "There are so many things unresolved." She paused then took a deep, and totally unnecessary, breath. "I still am not sure exactly how I should classify this planet. We cannot honestly classify this system as totally hostile or dead yet we need to make sure that these people are allowed to develop their own society without outside interference." She looked down at the floor for a few seconds then again looked back up into his eyes. "And I have no idea what I should do about Markath."

"What do you want to do about Markath?" He asked.

She thought a moment then responded with a totally real and human sigh. "I would like to take him with us but I don't know if that is even feasible."

**____****Continued in Part 18**

___( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and_'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promise not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	18. Decisions And Revelations

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

**Chapter 18 : ************Decisions and Revelations**

Alex looked at Tia with quiet sympathy as she looked back, her eyes full of worry and indecision. For several seconds neither of them spoke. Her comment had started Alex thinking in a new direction. When not thinking about the satellite project his mind had been on what he should put in the official report on Pern. He had not even thought about Markath since he had gone out to Tia's ship to retrieve the spare power cells. Now he found himself seriously considering the possibility of taking the little black dragon with them when they had to leave Pern.

After a few minutes of silence Alex finally spoke. "You know that if he grows to only half the size of Ruth he will be too large to comfortably live on your ship. He is already nearly as large as you and those wings are already large enough to be a problem in the narrow confines of the ship."

Before the discussion could continue Tia remarked. "Markath is awake and he's hungry." She smiled apologetically at Alex. "I have to go feed him." She turned and hurried toward the exit.

Alex turned in the opposite direction and returned to the work room. He reported that Tia had gone to feed Markath and then he, Lessa, Jaxom and F'lar set to work reassembling the outer panels on the second completed satellite.

While they were working Lessa inquired of Alex, "How much longer are you and Tia going to be able to stay on Pern?"

Alex paused a moment to consider before responding. "We have some leeway in our projected schedule for our current mission but we still can't spend too much time on any one planet. Originally, we had only expected to spend less than a day running a standard scan of a supposedly dead world. Up until now we have never spent more than three days at any one world. We started this project with a list of nearly a thousand lost colonies to check out and we are just a little over halfway through. I wish we could spend a few years here getting to know Pern and its people but we still have two years worth of work ahead of us and we will have to leave within the next two or three days if we want to avoid getting too far behind." He paused in thought for a moment then continued. "If we have any time left when we finish our mission I would like to stop back by here just to see how everyone is doing."

"What about Markath?" Sharra asked. "Are you going to take him with you?"

Again Alex paused before responding. "Tia and I are still trying to work that out." He shrugged. "That decision has not yet been settled."

~ o ~

Tia arrived out in the open bowl of the weyr at the same time as Talen, T'cab and T'ia. She spotted Markath making his way toward the Weyrling area and joined her newest friends that were also heading in that direction.

Tia joined Markath and once again Talen stepped in to help her. While feeding and oiling him Tia gauged Markath's size visually, which for her was surprisingly accurate, and commented mostly to herself. "Alex is right. You are growing fast."

In her mind she heard Markath's amused and proud reply. '_I'm a dragon so I grow fast._'

She slapped his flank affectionately as she replied. '_That you are, a beautiful black dragon._'

'_Will I ever be big enough to carry you against thread?_' Markath asked with a slightly plaintive tone.

Tia stared at him a moment in surprise. Finally she answered a bit hesitantly. '_No one really knows how big you will eventually get._' She paused, sighed and continued, a bit sadly. '_But even if you do grow big enough I could never ride you into threadfall. I cannot go that far from my ship without losing contact with this body. I would end up being just dead weight._'

Markath did not speak again while Talen and Tia finished oiling his black hide. Tia couldn't help worrying about Markath's solemn demeanor after their last exchange but she didn't know what to do about it.

Markath had eaten much lighter than expected so Tia and Talen were soon finished. With a little extra time on their hands they helped T'ia and T'cab finish taking care of Cornath and Radeth's needs. Rather than going back to his usual place to sleep, Markath remained and quietly watched Tia and Talen working on the other two dragons belonging to Talen's children.

Once they were finished with Cornath and Radeth, those two stuffed and oiled dragons waddled back to the weyrling cavern to sleep off their latest meal. T'cab and T'ia went off with the other new dragonriders while Tia and Talen headed back toward the workshop cavern. Markath followed right behind Tia and Talen.

As they reentered the workshop cavern Markath settled himself in a corner where he would be out of the way. Everyone in the room looked at Markath in surprise and curiosity. After a few minutes to recover from the surprise of his presence everyone returned to their tasks while Markath sat there and quietly observed.

All day Tia had been bothered by the nagging feeling that there was something about the whole detection satellite plan that she was missing. Tia went over to look at the diagrams spread out on the central table. Something about the proposed orbital configurations had been bothering her for a while. The original plan had four of the satellites in geosynchronous orbit along Pern's equator. The other two satellites would be in a slightly lower polar orbit. This was to cover the hole left above the north and south poles by the other four satellites.

She went back and checked the angle of detection chart again and it finally hit her. "Of course!" She exclaimed.

Everyone in the room now looked at Tia in surprise and curiosity. It was Jaxom that inquired about her outburst. "What is it, Tia? Did we miss something else?"

Tia shook her head. "Not really." She shrugged. "Your plan will work perfectly as it is but you don't really need all six satellites to get the full coverage that you need." She beckoned them over to the table containing all of the plans and diagrams. "The detectors sweep an area of space 130 degrees wide. This would leave the sky above the north and south poles uncovered. In order to get full coverage you have two of the satellites in a polar orbit.

Tia looked at the others and saw Jaxom, Sharra and F'lar nodding their heads. The others did not appear to understand what she meant.

Tia explained her idea. "You, actually, only need three satellites to get the full coverage that you want. You set the satellites in geosynchronous orbit like you originally intended only you just use three of them equally spaced in their orbits. Three satellites would be 120 degrees apart but they each cover 130 degrees giving enough overlap to get constant coverage along the ecliptic. You set one of them to point 20 degrees above the ecliptic and one to point 20 degrees below the ecliptic. The third would be pointed directly along the ecliptic. That gives you complete coverage of the poles and still leaves you with complete continuous coverage of the ecliptic where any dangerous asteroids are most likely to appear." She cocked her head toward the wall where the six satellites rested. "That leaves you with three spare satellites and four spare power supplies held in reserve." She inclined her head toward the remaining power cells placed against the wall near the satellites. "This would also mean that if there are no problems you would have enough spare power supplies to keep your detection system going for a minimum of five hundred years."

There was dead silence as they each processed what she was saying. To everyone's surprise it was Markath that was the first to respond. They all heard him in their minds. '_Tia is right. I can see the image in her mind_.' He then projected the image of the satellite placement and their coverage area into the minds of the others in the room. '_There are a few small gaps but no area will be un-scanned for more than six hours_.'

Jaxom looked over at Markath with a face that radiated incredulity. "You can see and understand that image?"

Markath looked directly at Jaxom but everyone heard the dragon's response. '_I see and understand_.'

F'lar shook his head as he commented. "Markath is only two days old yet he is smarter and more articulate than any of the full grown dragons."

Markath responded. '_I learn from Tia. I see what she thinks and I remember_.'

Jaxom jumped in. "Tia is right. I see it from the images Markath gave us. That new configuration will work." Jaxom addressed Markath. "You have learned everything that you know from Tia?"

Markath's response was slow in coming. '_Not everything . . . I learn some things from the cold minds that Tia talks to_.' There was a bit of uncertainty to Markath's voice in their minds.

There was another couple of seconds of silence as everyone tried to understand Markath's reference.

Tia was the first to break the silence with an exclamation of surprised realization. "The AI's ! You're talking about the Artificial Intelligence machines on my ship?"

Though Markath's response was directed at Tia, the others also heard it in their minds. '_Yes that is right. I did not know until now what they were. When you are asleep I have been able to talk to them directly. They are very cold . . . no life, not very smart . . . but they know a lot of things and I have learned a lot from them. They are where you are storing all of your experiences. I know that you are very fond of this planet and these people. I know that you want to find a way to make an accurate report on this place and still let them retain their independence and isolation._'

There was total stunned silence as the words of the little black dragon sank in. Each one mulled over Markath's words that had significance to them. Those native to Pern were most interested in the fact that Tia wanted to help them preserve what they had without outside interference. Tia and Alex were wondering how Markath could communicate with Tia's computers and what secrets he might have found.

Tia finally blurted out, surprised and a bit wary. "How can you talk to my AI's? They are machines!"

Markath responded almost defensively. '_I can only do it when you are asleep. I would not betray your secrets_.' There was a pause then the black dragon continued, his mental voice now tinged with sadness. '_I know that you must leave soon and do not think you will be able to take me with you_.'

Another moment of stunned silence finally broken by Tia, her voice also now tinged with sorrow. "No, my dear friend, I must be leaving Pern very soon and I do not think that I can take you with me." She shook her head. You are too young and you are still growing larger every day and I do not know enough to be able to properly care for you. You need to stay here with people who know how to care for a growing dragon." There was another pause then Tia continued. "I do worry about you. Since you did not impress like the other dragons, who will take responsibility for you?"

F'lar spoke up in ringing tones. "Markath is a Benden dragon! **Bendon** will raise him and watch over him!"

Lessa nodded her approval of F'lar's declaration.

Markath responded. '_Talen likes me and would like to keep me around_.'

Jaxom remarked. "Talen's ship will soon be finished and he will have to leave here to take command of it."

Markath responded. '_His children also like me_.' His head swiveled and he looked at F'lar. '_Can they care for me until I can be on my own?_'

F'lar looked down as he thought for a few seconds then glanced at Lessa who nodded back. "That might be an acceptable solution." He then looked at Markath. "We will try that and see how it works . . . provided T'ia and T'cab are both willing." He then faced Tia and Alex. "How much longer will you be able to stay?"

Alex responded. "At the most two to three days then we must continue with our mission."

Sharra joined into the conversation. "Before you leave Pern, you should visit Fort Hold. It is the first hold and it is where the main harper and healer halls are located. And I know Lord Gorghe would welcome the prestige of your visit."

Tia responded. "I think I would like that. I found Lord Groghe to be a very sharp and astute man when I talked to him on the dance floor at the hatching . . . and I liked him." She smiled. "I would also like to spend some time talking with Master Sebell, Master Menolly and some of the other harpers."

Alex chimed in. "Now that you mention it, I would also be interested to see Fort Hold."

Jaxom nodded. "It's getting late and we have to get back to Ruatha. I'll stop by and see Lord Groghe on the way. Ruth will let you know what Lord Groghe says about a visit." He turned to his wife. "Come on Sharra, it's time for us to go and we have a few stops to make along the way."

Jaxom and Sharra made their way out to the open bowl followed by the rest of those present. Ruth was waiting for them.

T'ia met them carrying Sharra and Jaxom's riding jackets and head gear. "Markath told me you needed these." She remarked as she handed them over.

"Thank-you T'ia." Sharra responded.

Jaxom and Sharra donned their riding gear then Jaxom inquired if Ruth was ready. Ruth leaned down, extending a foreleg as a single step up. In her mind Tia heard Ruth respond. '_I am always ready to carry you._' Jaxom quickly mounted onto Ruth's neck just in front of where it joined his shoulders then reached his hand down toward Sharra. Sharra took his hand and steped onto Ruth's extended foreleg then swung up into position directly behind Jaxom.

Ruth unfurled and raised his wings high then leaped into the air. On the second down stroke Ruth was already several meters in the air but they still heard Jaxom call out. "I hope we will see you tomorrow." Jaxom waved quickly to them then seemed to turn his attention to his dragon. Ruth quickly rose upward until he was even with the upper rim of Benden Weyr then he winked out of existence.

Tia, T'ia, Alex, F'lar and Lessa looked at each other for a minute before Lessa finally spoke. "Well, it's getting late and I have to make sure everything is as it should be before I can retire for the night." They all then headed back toward the caves.

**____****Continued in Part 19**

___( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and_'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	19. The trip To Fort

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

**Chapter 19 : ****************The trip To Fort **

About an hour after Jaxom and Sharra had left Benden Weyr on Ruth, Markath, Ramoth and Tia had received a message from Ruth. The invitation to visit Fort Hold had been extended by Lord Holder Groghe himself. Jaxom had informed Lord Groghe that Tia would have to bring her ship with her. Lord Groghe had suggested that, if it was close enough, she should land her ship in Fort Weyr to insure her safety from Abominator attacks.

Though their leadership had been permanently banished over five turns ago, The Abominators had not disappeared. There were still enough of them around, well hidden, to occasionally cause problems.

After consulting the maps of Pern that were stored in her AI systems, she had informed Jaxom, through Ruth, that the two locations were close enough.

About a half hour later Tia was contacted by Margatta, Weyrwoman of Fort Weyr, through her golden queen dragon, Ludeth. Ludeth told Tia that they would be happy to host Tia's ship during her visit to Fort Hold. They would be expecting her at Fort Weyr in the morning and would have an area set aside in the bowl for her to land.

Tia also overheard Ludeth relaying a message to Ramoth. F'lar and Lessa were invited to meet at Fort Weyr to discuss the latest state of the satellite program. After hearing Jaxom telling about his ride down from orbit inside Tia's ship, F'lar and Lessa had both expressed curiosity about what it was like. They were invited to ride over to Fort Weyr in Tia and, with their dragon's approval, accepted

A short time later everyone turned in for the night. After Alex had turned in, Tia set her avatar to keep watch over Markath Tia ran a complete systems check then she set a couple of her servos to work installing two additional acceleration chairs in her main control cabin. Once all of those tasks were completed, Tia set her nutrient mixture for sleep. Although shell people did not really need to rest, since their physical bodies never moved, they did need to dream. So at least two to three hours of sleep out of every twenty-four was recommended, though shell people could easily, and often did, go several days without sleep and suffer no ill effects.

~ DRnBS ~

The light of the rising sun gilded the top of the western ridge of Benden's caldera wall in shades of gold and red. One of the AI's in Hypatia's ship sent a signal to her brain and Tia awakened. Her first act was to run a quick scan of the area around her ship and set in motion all of the normal morning functions that would make her ready for Alex to wake up. Then she took possession of her avatar body and gazed out across the slowly brightening bowl. Dawn of their fifth day on Pern had begun. Across the bowl near the main caverns she could see a few workers stirring, early risers getting everything ready for another typical day in Benden Weyr.

Tia looked down at the little black dragon that lay pressed up against her hull. She measured his size by sight. He was definitely larger. She plotted a rough growth curve based on her previous measurements. At his current rate of growth she figured that within three to four weeks Markath would be as large as Alex. Within three months he would be too big to fit through the corridors of her ship. As she gazed down on Markath's sleeping form, she felt a sharp twinge of regret. As much as she wanted to take him with her she knew that it simply would not be possible.

Tia glanced over at the Weyrling barracks where the young riders were already getting prepared to feed the hungry young hatchlings that would soon awaken. Tia started moving quickly over to the training area. She figured that she had maybe about an hour until Markath and the other hatchlings awoke, ravenous for their morning meal. When Tia reached the training area, she found Talen already there getting everything ready for Markath's morning feeding. Tia stayed to help but Talen did most of the work feeding and oiling the little black dragon.

As soon as Markath had finished feeding F'lar and Lessa showed up ready to go to Fort Weyr. Talen assured Tia that he would be happy to take care of Markath so that she would be free to go on to Fort.

~ o ~

F'lar and Lessa looked about in a mild state of wonder as Tia guided them through her ship to the control cabin. As they entered the cabin she continued her description. ". . . and this is my main control cabin. Most of the ship's functions can be controlled and monitored from here if I am not tied in . . ." She gestured to herself. ". . . like when I am in this avatar body." She pointed at the column that dominated the main cabin. "Inside that column is where my shell is mounted. Alex and I are the only two people that know the code required to open the access panel to that column."

Lessa's eyes scanned the central column and she gave a little shiver. "That is such a small space. There is hardly any room to move around."

"I don't move around at all. My shell is almost the same size and shape as those six satellites we were working on yesterday and it is more or less permanently mounted in a cavity just large enough to hold it. The rest of that space is filled with all of the electronics and machinery necessary to maintain my shell and link me to the rest of my ship. I am no more aware of confinement than your brain is aware of being confined inside your head. Most of the time, this ship is my body. The only time that is not so is when I am linked to this avatar body."

Lessa again shivered. "I understand what you are telling me but it is still hard for me to completely comprehend the reality."

"Don't worry about it. No one can truly comprehend what it is like except another shell person." Tia shrugged. "I grew up with a shell person as my best friend. I thought I knew it all when I decided to become a shell person. What I thought it would be like was so far from the reality that I was shocked at how different it really was. But I would never willingly go back to what I was."

F'lar commented. "I suppose in many ways it is like being a dragonrider. No one can truly understand what it is like to have your mind so intimately linked to another living creature until you have experienced impression for yourself."

Tia paused a moment as her mind was flooded with memories of feelings and sensations from that day on Benden's hatching ground.

Noticing the look on Tia's face, F'lar cocked his head. "Though you seemed to have come very close."

After another moment's silence Tia finally spoke. "Ahem, if you will each take a seat, we will begin our flight to Fort Weyr."

Once everyone was strapped in, Tia, in her avatar, took the remaining seat. After a second her face became completely blank. A few seconds later she was rapidly accelerating toward sub-orbital space. She was following the same type of flight path she had used to get from Ruatha to Benden. During the heavy acceleration she kept a careful watch on the vital health indicators of her two first time passengers. Though tense and excited, they showed no signs of real fear. As soon as she entered the sub-orbital free fall part of their trip she activated the main view screen and returned her control to her avatar body. She quickly scanned the ship's instrument panels to make sure that there were no problems indicated then turned her attention to her two guests who were both staring raptly at the main view screen.

"For the next ten minutes we will be coasting, then I will begin ten minutes of deceleration and reentry."

The bottom half of the screen was filled with the obviously curved surface of Pern. The upper half of the screen was filled with a spectacular star field. In the upper left corner of the screen, one of Pern's two moons could be clearly seen. Tia spoke softly. "What you see on the screen is but a fraction of what I see when I am looking through my ships external video sensors but it will give you an idea what it is like for me when I am traveling through space."

"That is incredible." Lessa spoke in an awed whisper as she gazed at the screen.

"That was a very wild ride." F'lar remarked turning his gaze to Tia. "Now I can understand what Jaxom was going on so excitedly about."

For the next ten minutes the four of them talked about various features of Pern as they passed by on the main screen and Tia answered a few questions about life in space. Then it was time to begin their descent and after a quick warning from Tia, her face went completely blank as she again took control of her ship. The ride down was just as fast as the ride up had been with the view screen showing the rapidly approaching surface.

As she approached the extinct volcano that contained Fort Weyr, Tia could easily make out the clearly marked area that had been set aside for Tia's arrival. When she was about a mile above the Weyr a pair of riderless dragons appeared a few hundred feet from her and began following her down. Tia quickly identified them as Lessa's Ramoth and F'lar's Mnementh. The two dragons escorted Tia's ship the rest of the way down to the ground.

As Tia set down in the clearing, Ramoth and Mnementh settled to the ground on either side of her. A minute later another gold and bronze dragon pair landed near her. N'ton and Margatta dismounted from their dragons and stood together before her main passenger hatch. There was a proud commanding air to their stance.

As Tia and Alex stepped out of the hatch, followed by F'lar and Lessa. N'ton pulled himself even more erect than he had been and called out in rather formal tones. "Welcome to Fort Weyr Lady Starship Hypatia and Starship Master Alexander." They stepped forward and clasped hands then F'lar and Lessa stepped forward and were drawn into a hearty clasp of hands. "F'lar, Lessa, it is always good to see you both at Fort."

At that moment a dragon perched on the rim wall bellowed a greeting as Jaxom and Sharra on white Ruth popped into existence above. A few minutes later Ruth landed near the other four dragons and dropped off his two passengers.

As Jaxom and Sharra were being greeted by N'ton and Margatta, one of Tia's servos came out of the main hatch carrying a two foot diameter, roughly spherical, object. Tia took the object from the servo. The servo then retraced its path back into her ship.

Jaxom was the first to speak as he pointed to the round object in Tia's hand. "What is that?"

Tia responded. "This is a repeater unit. It doubles my operation range." She looked at N'ton. "I will need to find a place that is relatively inaccessible and about halfway between here and Fort Hold. Otherwise I run the risk of losing the connection between myself and this body."

N'ton and Margatta looked at each other a moment then Margatta looked back at Tia and spoke. "I think I know just the place. We can drop it off when we fly over to the hold." She then glanced at N'ton and continued. "Lady Hypatia, N'ton and I would be honored if you and Lord Alexander would ride to Fort Hold with us . . . unless you would rather take your flying sled."

Tia smiled back. "Please, we are among friends here. Call us Tia and Alex . . . and we would both love the opportunity to ride dragonback."

N'ton and Margatta both returned Alex and Tia's friendly smiles as N'ton spoke. "Since the distance is so short, we would be flying straight rather than jumping between." Bronze dragon Lioth approached the group as N'ton continued. "Alex, you will ride with me on Lioth and Tia will ride with Margatta on Ludeth."

Lioth kneeled down and N'ton climbed up onto Lioth then reached down to help Alex climb up to perch directly behind him. Lioth stood back up and backed away from the group. Ludeth came forward and knelt down so that Margatta could mount her. F'lar held the repeater while Tia climbed up onto Ludeth and settled herself behind Margatta.

F'lar momentarily hefted the repeater module. Though not as heavy as he had expected the repeater was not light. He looked up at Tia. "Are you sure you can hold this all the way to the Fort Hold?" He shrugged. "I can carry this for you if you wish."

Tia shook her head. "That is not necessary. I can easily carry it. I may not be as strong as you but I do not suffer from fatigue." F'lar handed the repeater up to her then he and Lessa returned to their dragons. Meanwile Jaxom and Sharra returned to Ruth.

Once everyone was mounted on dragonback the five dragons took off and swiftly climbed until they were all well above the Weyr rim. Then the five dragons took off toward the east where Fort Hold was located.

As they flew over the rugged terrain Alex found himself grinning like a child from the thrill of ridding on the back of the great bronze dragon, Lioth. He glanced around and realized that the five dragons were flying in a very precise 'V' formation. What surprised him the most was that it was Ruth that was flying point with Ramoth and Mnementh flying the ends. He looked across the 'V' at Tia riding on Golden Ludeth, a grin of delight plastered across her face. There was no doubt that she was enjoying the ride just as much as he was.

After several minutes Alex was brought out of his enthralled state when they began to descend toward a very rocky area. Ludith settled onto a particularly inaccessible promontory. The other four dragons settled on a ridge about a hundred meters from that point. Tia slid off of Ludith's neck and proceeded to mount the repeater unit to the top of that promontory. Once she had assured herself that the repeater was secured and functioning properly, she climbed back up onto Ludith. All five dragons simultaneously leaped into the air and were again winging their way east toward Fort Hold

A short while later Alex spotted a cliff edge with markings similar to those at the top of Ruatha Hold. A second later they flew past the edge of the cliff. Fort Hold was laid out below them against the East face of the massive cliff. Fort Hold looked to be five times the size of Ruatha and there was a fair sized group of people standing at the bottom of the ramp that led down from the main hold.

The dragons cut a wide arc as they came around to approach the hold openly from the east with the rising sun at their backs. Soon the five dragons landed simultaneously, still in the 'V' formation, before the welcoming committee. The passengers quickly dropped to the ground and came together in front of Ruth.

Lord Holder Groghe stepped out from the waiting group and strode confidently forward toward the new arrivals. On his shoulder was riding a golden queen fire lizard. As Lord Groghe reached his guests the little golden fire lizard began to get agitated. Ruth emitted a short bark like sound and the fire lizard settled down.

Lord Groghe smiled as he reached out and clapped his hands on Alex and Tia's shoulders. "Lady Starship Tia and Starship Master Alex, it is good to see you both again. He spread his arms wide to include all of his guests. "Welcome to Fort Hold, oldest and largest of Pern's holds and sight of the Main Harper hall and the Main Healer Hall." He turned to face the others that had been waiting with him. "Come let me introduce you to the rest of my household."

**____****Continued in Part 20**

___( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and_'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	20. Visiting Fort Hold and the Harper Hall

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

**Chapter 20 : ****************Visiting Fort Hold and the Harper Hall **

Lord Groghe quickly introduced each of the members of the group that had been standing there with him. Alex knew that he could never remember all of their names but he knew that he could count on Tia to remind him if he needed to know. Tia, for her part, stored away the name, face and pertinent data for each person into her database. For her it was like having an eidetic memory that she only had access to when she wanted it. She was aware that Alex had a less than perfect memory for names and faces but she could easily remind him through his com unit implant when needed.

One couple in particular caught Tia's attention. Both of them sported firelizards perched on their shoulders. The tall handsome man was introduced as Benis, Lord Groghe's eldest son and successor. The half dozen very thin old scars across his face were barely visible and did little to detract from his features that strongly echoed those of his sire, Lord Groghe. He exuded the same air of command as his father and had already assumed most of the responsibilities of ruling Fort Hold. Beside Bemis stood a beautiful elegant woman that was introduced as his wife, Briala. She too had a couple of very thin scars on her left cheek that echoed those of her husband. Tia noticed that she made no attempt to hide the scars, though a simple change in hairstyle would have sufficed. Tia suspected that there must be an interesting tale behind those matching scars.

Once the introductions were completed Lord Groghe dismissed the members of his household and turned toward the main entrance. Accompanied by his eldest son, his son's wife and the hold's head woman he led his guests up the ramp to the hold; all the while telling about the history of Fort Hold and its two primary Halls. The first place he took them was to the main dining hall where a light meal had been set out for the Lord Groghe's family and his guests.

As they sat at the tables eating and chatting with Lord Groghe and his family, Alex found himself musing about common human customs. It seemed that in every culture, they had encountered to date, the first order of business, when guests came calling, was to feed them. Tia noticed that though Lord Groghe was a very jovial character, everyone around him was well aware of his rank and title. It was apparent to her that he and his son took title of Lord Holder much more seriously than Lord Jaxom did yet they still, very subtly, deferred to Lord Jaxom. It was becoming more obvious as time passed that Lord Jaxom held a very special place among the inhabitants of Pern beyond that of just Lord Holder of Ruatha.

A half hour later F'lar, Lessa, Jaxom and Sharra went off to deal with other business while Alex and Tia were given a quick tour (if you could call two hours quick) of the hold. Fort Hold was huge. Tia noticed that the place was very well maintained. She also noticed that Lord Benis was very much the Lord Holder of his domain, deferring only to his father, and commanded total respect from the rest of the hold's inhabitants. They both showed total gracious courtesy to everyone they encountered (even the lowliest drudge) yet there still was no doubt that Benis was the final authority here, except when Lord Groghe stepped in. Even on the rare occasion that she heard someone address them as simply Groghe or Benis, the 'Lord' was clearly implied.

~ o ~

Finally Alex and Tia were shown the way to the guest quarters. They were also assigned a drudge (the local term for a servant) who was tasked to look after their needs. Then Lord Groghe suggested that they might like to see the Harper Hall next, adding that Masterharpers Sebell and Menolly were anxiously awaiting their visit. Lord Benis excused himself, stating that he had hold business to tend to and left.

As they approached the arched opening into the Harper Hall, they could see Sebell and Menolly as well as Jaxom, Sharra and a few other older men standing beyond the archway waiting for them. Sebell stepped forward under the opening and raised his arm in greeting. "Welcome to Harper Hall, Master Alex and Lady Tia. We are honored by your visit." Menolly stepped forward to join Sebell just as Tia, Alex and Lord Groghe reached them.

Lord Groghe nodded toward Alex and Tia. "I am placing you in the capable hands of the Masterharpers of Pern and will take my leave now. Like my son, I also have hold business to attend to but I hope to see you for dinner this evening." He inclined his head toward Sebell and Menolly. "That invitation is also extended to you, Master Sebell and Master Menolly." He took a step back. "Until this evening." He turned smartly on his heel strode away toward the ramp into the main hold.

Sebell extended his elbow out to Tia as Menolly hooked her arm through Alex's elbow. Sebell addressed Tia and Alex. "Shall we begin the tour with an introduction to the other masters of my craft hall?" He led Tia and Alex over toward the small knot of people standing just the other side of the archway.

Tia and Alex became aware of singing that got louder as they passed through the archway. They came out of the archway into a large rectangular courtyard and the singing became much stronger and clearer. The singing could now be determined to be coming from the windows in the wall to their left. Tia recognized it as the song that Menolly had written about her and Alex. This time there was a complex harmony added to the song giving it more depth and meaning.

The music ceased just as Sebell began introducing the people that had been waiting. First there was Master Talmor who was in charge of teaching voice, and Journeywoman Audiva who taught basic music theory to the youngest students. Tia could tell right away that there was a very strong connection between those two. If they weren't married they were the next thing to it. Tia also noticed occasional knowing looks between Audiva, Talmor and Menolly indicating a close friendship. She filed those observations away for future reference.

Next they were introduced to Master Jerint, expert in all types of musical instruments then Master Domick expert in composition and Silvina, headwoman of Harper Hall.

Tia became aware of movement off to her left and looked over in that direction. She noticed several young faces at the windows opening onto the courtyard and a middle aged man striding quickly toward her group. After a few jabs about being late, the man was introduced as Master Brudegan who specialized in teaching choir.

Sebell grinned and asked Brudegan how everything was going. Brudegan responded that the new version was working out well and they should be ready by dinnertime tonight.

All of the harpers were very interested in Tia and Alex. Nearly an hour was spent answering many questions about Tia's unique nature and about their life traveling from planet to planet.

Eventually Sebell noted that it was getting late and sent the various masters back to their duties then turned to escort his guests into the Harper Hall. Jaxom and Sharra fell into step behind the other four. The singing started up again just before they passed through the main doors to the hall. Sebell took them on a short tour of the various parts of the hall and they finally ended up in a small office-like space that Sebell identified as the Arch Room. It was so named because it was located above the main archway. There were large windows at either end of the room. One looked out over the open field that spread out before Fort Hold and the other looked out over the Harper Hall central courtyard. At Sebell's suggestion they all took seats in the ancient leather covered chairs that lined three walls of the room. They were one seat short so Jaxom ended up standing behind Sharra with his hands resting on her shoulders.

"Now that you've seen the place, what do you think of Harper Hall?" Sebell inquired.

Tia glanced over at Alex who cocked his head a moment then spoke. "You do a lot more here than just sing and write songs?" Though posed as a question Sebell had no doubt that he was simply stating what he knew.

Sebell nodded. "Yes we do. The Harper Hall is responsible for the spread of knowledge throughout Pern. We teach the basics to the young with teaching songs that are sometime as old as a couple of thousand turns. When something important happens we create songs that explain things to the average person."

Menolly jumped in. "We also help to maintain our language and culture. Many of our songs tell of our history. They tell us who we are and where we come from. The information Lord Jaxom sent back from your ship will soon be incorporated into a teaching ballad that will tell us how our colony on Pern began. With our teaching songs we maintain the stability of our language throughout Pern."

Sebell spoke again. "We also act as independent, unbiased arbiters whenever the need arises."

Alex nodded his head. "And I suppose that you also wield some influence behind the scenes as well?"

Sebell glanced a bit uncertainly over at Jaxom and Sharra then nodded. "We do exert a small amount of influence from time to time, when the people need a little nudge in the right direction." He leaned back in the plush sofa. "For instance we have tried to influence a favorable view among the population of your presence on our world. We will also have to deal with what will happen after you leave."

Tia noticed Jaxom giving a quick knowing glance at Sebell and wondered just how far the influence of the Harper Hall actually went. She turned her attention back to Sebell and commented. "And to that end, I suppose that you want to know what we will report and what kind of response you can expect from Central Worlds." She cocked her head. "Am I right?"

Sebell tilted his head and smiled back at her. "That is about the size of it." He gave a short chuckle. "All of Pern is anxious to know what will come next and how it will affect us."

Alex leaned back as Tia responded to Sebell's obvious inquiry. "To begin with, our report will reinforce the same overall dangerous environmental conditions spelled out in the report from the original rescue attempt. We will report that despite the conditions here that Pern is totally self sufficient agricultural society and a thriving healthy human culture but emphasize that it is still a very dangerous place for the unprepared. We will also emphasize that there is little of strategic value here on Pern. Our report will also make it plain that the people of Pern would prefer to remain isolated for the present but would not be adverse to possible minimal contact in the future. Although I seriously doubt that Central Worlds will want to interfere with Pern, our report will point out that the locals are very well able to defend their world from any outside interference. Our final recommendation will be that this system be interdicted until such time as **you** decide to initiate contact."

Alex took over. "We are planning to leave a subspace transmitter here so that, if the people of Pern ever do want to initiate contact, you will have the means to do so." He centered his gaze on Sebell. "I suspect that the Harper Hall would be the most logical place to keep the transmitter."

Menolly was gazing curiously back at Tia as she spoke. "You mentioned us being well able to defend our world from your people."

Tia paused to organize her thoughts. This was something she wanted to tell them. She was thinking that she would have preferred F'lar and Lessa to be here as well . . . then she realized that there was a way. She turned her attention to Jaxom. "What I wish to tell you is important to the welfare of Pern and should be heard by F'lar and Lessa as well. I am going to link to Ruth, Ramoth and Mnementh so that F'lar and Lessa can also hear what I have to say." Everyone in that room perked up as Tia communicated silently with the three dragons in question.

Tia nodded her satisfaction once the link was established and spoke. "I have been studying the culture and society of Pern since we first arrived and am fairly certain that I am now addressing the six most influential leaders of Pern." There was a momentary pause. "The same system that you are setting up to protect Pern from meteors would be just as effective in repelling any attempted invasion. Considering the capabilities of your dragons and firelizards, no military leader in his right mind would want to take you on. Our military wouldn't stand a chance." Her gaze swept the room. From the look on her face, there was no doubt how seriously she took what she was saying and they should pay close attention to what she was telling them. "No matter how powerful an invader's battleships are they cannot fight an opponent that can, at will, pop into the most sensitive area of their ships and leave behind very destructive packages." Another dramatic pause. "I also suspect that your dragons could shift or redirect a battleship just as easily as you believe that they could shift an asteroid. To put it bluntly . . . one of your dragons is more than the equal of one of our battleships and you have a couple of thousand of them."

There were several seconds of silence as everyone digested Tia's words. In the Healer Hall, Masterhealer Oldive looked on curiously as F'lar and Lessa reacted to what they were hearing through their dragons.

Those in the Harper Hall Arch Room were interrupted by a knock at the door. At a raised word from Sebell, headwoman Silvina entered the room, begging their pardon for the interruption and whispered something to Sebell. Sebell smiled at her and nodded his head, thanking her, and then she left.

Sebell looked solemnly at Tia and Alex. "We all appreciate your advice Lady Starship Hypatia and we will take your words to heart." Sebell took a deep breath and popped up to his feet then smiled at Tia and Alex. "Well, I think it is time to lighten the mood." The serious atmosphere that had settled in the room was instantly dissipated as everyone else rose from their seats. "I suggest we visit some of the classes to see how the students are doing and to let them meet the two visitors to our planet." Sebell led them down into the Harper Hall courtyard.

Sebell paused in the courtyard and looked, smiling, up into the clear sky. "It looks to be a beautiful day today." They all stood in the middle of the courtyard and took the time to appreciate the fine weather.

Just as they turned toward the doors that lead into the choir room they were joined by F'lar and Lessa. After a quick tour of the various classrooms it was time to head over to Fort Hold for the planned dinner.

The meal turned out to be a very festive occasion. Everyone of importance to the hold was there as well as several dragonriders from Fort Weyr. Naturally Alex and Tia were the center of attention. With the exception of those that had been to the Benden Weyr hatching, everyone wanted to meet the now fabled Lady Starship Hypatia and Starship Master Alexander.

As the dinner was coming to an end several young harpers, led by Master Brudegan filed into the dining hall and took up positions at the far end of the great room. They were quickly joined by a dozen masterharpers, carrying musical instruments, led by Master Domick. Master Brudegan faced the diners. "Tonight the Harper Hall at the invitation of Lord Groghe, present this music in honor of Lady Starship Hypatia and Starship Master Alexander. He then turned and raised his hands. With a quick down-sweep of his arms the hall filled with music as they launched into a full orchestral and choral treatment of the Ballad of Lady Starship Hypatia and Starship Master Alexander.

~ o ~

About an hour later found Tia strolling by herself through the nearly deserted main hall of the hold. Alex was off with Lord Jaxom, Lord Benis and Lord Groghe discussing some of the minutia of hold life. The dragonriders were out in the hold courtyard preparing to return to their weyrs. She was thinking about the events of the last five days. The inhabitants of this planet were an amazing people. They had taken an extremely biologically hostile environment and had turned it into their home while maintaining a generally upbeat culture. And they had prospered. If there was one thing she was sure of, it was that they had earned the right to live their lives the way they wanted without any outside interference. She intended to do everything she could to see to it that they got that.

The first hint of danger Tia had was when she caught the sudden movement of a large figure out of the corner of her eye. She was able to catch a glimpse of a very large man, his face twisted in pure unreasoning hatred, wielding a meter long metal bar. She just had time to raise her arm in defense before that metal bar came crashing down upon her upraised arm. Pain shot through her arm and shoulder as the force of the impact knocked her off her feet. Tia was momentarily stunned by the suddenness of the attack and the shock of unexpected pain as she cried out in distress.

**____****Continued in Part 21**

___(rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and_'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	21. Attack and Aftermath

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

**********************Chapter 21 : Attack and Aftermath**

The bar swung down again as Tia thought she heard the slightly distorted word "Abomination" and the name "Menolly" mixed in with the nearly unintelligible ranting of her attacker. Again she partially warded off the blow with her upraised right arm. Somewhere in the jumbled confusion of her mind she thought to shut off the channels carrying her sense of touch and, in this case, pain as the attacker closed in for another swing.

Tia's mind began to clear as her attacker again swung the metal bar. This time she pushed herself away from the ground with her left arm and tried to grab the bar but her damaged right arm was not functioning correctly. Again she was only able to block the blow with the damaged arm.

As the attacker swung again Tia became aware of multiple voices shouting as several men descended on Tia and her attacker. The big man managed to get a couple of more blows in before several others succeeded in pulling him away from her and dragging him to the ground.

For a moment Tia stared blankly at the tangle of struggling shouting bodies on the ground two meters away from her. Several of them were garbed in that ubiquitous Harper blue she had seen so much of. Then her attention was drawn to her mangled arm. It was badly bent in four places, only one of which was where a bend might be expected to be. The synthetic skin was torn in multiple places exposing the clearly mechanical workings inside and a few shreds of artificial muscle and wires hung loosely from various points. It was unquestionably damaged beyond repair.

"Lady Tia!" She heard several voices call out as she spotted Alex, Sebell, Menolly, Jaxom and Groghe running toward her.

The next words came from Lord Jaxom. "Shells! What have they done to you!?" At the same time Menolly sprinted over to the tangle of struggling bodies as Sebell was asking, "What happened here?" Alex, Jaxom and Sebell knelt by Tia's side, shock, anger and concern warring for possession of their faces. Then Lord Groghe and Lord Benis were standing over her. "What is going on here . . . Shells!" Benis exclaimed, His face turning red with emotion, as he also knelt beside Tia. Next Alex spoke, his voice full of concern and sympathy. "Oh, Tia, your arm, it's ruined."

Lord Groghe remained standing looking down at her for a couple of seconds as his florid face became redder than usual then he looked over at Menolly and the group of men as they tried to subdue the violently struggling attacker. One of them grabbed the end of the bar still held tightly in the attackers hand and brought it sharply down on the attackers head and the fight went completely out of him. Then they hauled the stunned man to his feet. Lord Groghe's face turned cold with suppressed anger as he spoke. "Get that thing out of my sight. I will deal with him later." He glared after them as they dragged the still weakly resisting man away.

Tia noticed that Menolly was following them, a look of confusion and concern on her face. She also noticed Sebell gazing momentarily after them, a look of sadness and worry on his face then his expression shifted to one of concern as he turned his attention back to Tia.

Lord Groghe turned around and faced them as Alex and Jaxom helped Tia to her feet. "Lady Tia, I am so sorry that this happened." He glanced at her mangled arm and winced. "That this kind of thing should happen in my Hold is inexcusable." He took in the now obviously artificial nature of the damaged arm then looked back at her now serene face. "Is there anything that I or my craftsmen can do for you?"

Tia glanced down at the arm then replied. "I'm afraid this arm is damaged beyond repair. I don't think even the people that made it can repair the damage." She looked up at Lord Groghe. "Do not blame yourself. You are not responsible for that fool's unreasoning hatred. This is not your fault."

At that moment a very upset man came running toward them. "Lord Benis! Where is Lord Benis!?" He skidded to a stop and glanced indecisively between Lord Benis and Lord Groghe.

Benis responded. "What is the problem?"

That seemed to make the man's mind up. "Lord Benis, sir, someone has stolen two of our best runners. I just went out to make a final check. The lock on the pens was broken and the two best breeders were missing."

Benis faced the rest and pointed to two of the men that had helped subdue the attacker. "You and you, come with me. Master Sebell, I need your drums to send out the word to everyone to be on the lookout for the missing runners and to detain whoever has them . . ."

Jaxom jumped in as Sebell ran out of the hall. "I have Ruth in the air searching for your runners. If they are anywhere nearby, Ruth will find them."

"Thankyou, for your help, Lord Jaxom." He glanced at Tia, a deep frown creased his face. "Two of you help Lady Tia to her guest quarters. The rest of you go about your business." He paused a moment looking at Tia's damaged arm. "Lady Tia, is there anything that can be done about that damage to your arm?" He asked her.

Tia glanced around at the concerned faces of the others then responded. "I kept some of the undamaged parts from my previous avatar body. It won't be a perfect match but I do have a right arm that can serve as temporary replacement until I can get back to central worlds. They're stored in the number three cargo hold. I will need someone to take me back to my ship tomorrow morning."

Jaxom responded. "Ruth and I will be happy to take you after he returns."

"Thankyou, Lord Jaxom." She smiled her appreciation.

With that Jaxom, Alex and Lord Groghe escorted Tia to her and Alexander's quarters. When they arrived at the guest quarters a young woman was waiting there for them. She stared openly at Tia's damaged arm, her face frozen in stunned surprise.

"Jenna." Lord Groghe called to her with no visible effect. "**Jenna!**" He exclaimed louder.

The young woman nearly jumped out of her skin emitting a startled squeak. Lord Groghe went over to her and laid his hand gently on her shoulder. "Jenna, it's all right." He talked soothingly at her. "These two people are Master Alex and Lady Tia. They are our guests and you are assigned to them. Do you understand?" The woman quickly calmed down in response to Lord Groghe's calm voice. "You are to give them whatever help that they request of you." He held her gaze for a moment. "Do you understand?"

The young woman blinked and nodded her head in response. "Yes sir."

While Lord Groghe was talking to Jenna, Tia felt the worried touch of Markath in her mind. '_How are you? What happened?_'

'_I'm all right, Markath. I was attacked but the damage isn't serious. Don't worry about me._' She responded.

"If there is anything either of you need just ask Jenna." Lord Groghe gave the woman's shoulder a gentle squeeze as he addressed Tia and Alex. "Jenna is just a little bit slow but if you speak clearly and concisely she will understand and do her best to do what you ask." He released Jenna's shoulder. "Jenna, have you had your dinner yet?" The young woman shook her head then Groghe continued. "In that case, head on out to the kitchen and get some food and drink. When you come back, have the cook give you a small plate of snacks and a pitcher of water to bring back for our guests." He turned Jenna and gave her a gentle push toward the door. "Now get."

After the woman left the room Groghe turned back to face Alex and Tia's quizzical looks. "Jenna is one of the unfortunate results of our situation here on Pern. There were just barely enough of the original colonists to provide a large enough genetic pool for a viable colony. Over a third of those original colonists were lost in the first threadfall. As a result of the reduced original gene pool we have a high percentage of people like Jenna born every year. They may be slow, mentally, but they make good loyal workers and we do our best to take care of them." Groghe nodded to Alex and Tia. "Now I must leave you, but I will have two guards stationed at the end of the corridor to prevent a repeat of what happened to Lady Tia. If you need anything, just tell Jenna or one of the guards and they will take care of you." With one more nod Lord Groghe turned and left their quarters.

As soon as Lord Groghe was gone Alex turned to Tia deep concern showing in his eyes. "Just how bad are you damaged?" He inquired as he peered closely at her.

"It's like I told Lord groghe, The only damage is to my arm. It's pretty much destroyed but I have a suitable replacement back at the ship that will be more than adequate until we return to Central Worlds." She replied to him. "Don't worry about me. I'll be fine." Tia walked into the inner bedroom chamber and sat down in one of the three chairs. "I need to get everything ready back at the ship." The life in her eyes died as Tia returned her control to her ship.

The first thing Tia did was check the view through her external scanners. She noticed an inordinate amount of activity in the weyr bowl. Several dragons with their riders took to the air and soon vanished. Tia focused on Ludeth who was pacing and fretting on the ledge outside the queen's weyr. '_What is going on?_' Tia inquired.

Ludeth stopped pacing and responded. '_Several of us have gone to help Ruth search for the ones who stole Lord Groghe's two prize runners. They think the thieves were involved with the one that attacked you._'

Tia acknowledged Ludeth's response then began preparations for tomorrows repair job.

~ o ~

Shortly after Tia returned control to her ship Alex filled the time looking around their temporary quarters. It was made up of two chambers. The larger outer chamber was a combination sitting room, dining room and office. Alex noticed that in addition to the expected furnishings, there was a low pallet or cot over next to the outer door. The smaller inner room was basically a bedroom. The two rooms were separated by a heavy wooden door.

About twenty minutes later Jenna returned carrying a tray with a small plate filled with snacks, two cups and a large pitcher of water. After setting the water and snacks out she quietly and efficiently went around making sure that the quarters were in good orderly condition then took her apparent station on the cot by the outer door.

~ DRnBS ~

The next morning Tia and Alex were in the middle of their breakfast when Lord Groghe arrived at their quarters. "May I come in?" He asked from the open doorway.

"Of course, Lord Groghe. Come in." Alex responded then waved his hand negligently toward the table. "There is plenty of food here if you are hungry."

As Lord Groghe entered their outer chamber he began speaking. "I have already had breakfast. I just came by to see how you are doing and let you know what has been happening." He took a seat at the table and continued. "One of the thieves was found to the north of Fort Hold riding one of the stolen runners. Both the thief and the runner have been brought back to Fort Hold. The second stolen runner was found abandoned to the east of Fort Hold. We have not yet found the second thief." He paused a moment before continuing. "The man that attacked you is named Camo. He has the apparent IQ of a five year old child and has lived all his life in the Harper Hall. From what he was able to tell us, he was manipulated by the two other men. They convinced him that you were here to kill Menolly and her firelizards and he believed that he was protecting them. What those two men did to Camo is just plain evil. Those two men and their kind are the true abominations." Lord Groghe paused, his fists momentarily clenched in anger. He visibly regained control of his emotions then continued. "Based on what we learned from Camo, the man that stole the runner will be tried. He already has a sentence of several years in the mines for stealing my best runners. If found guilty of being an abominator and inciting the attacker to violence, he will be banished, a far worse punishment, believe me. When the other thief is found he will receive the same justice as his companion."

Tia looked back at Groghe. "Lord Groghe, what will happen to that poor man that attacked me?"

Lord Groghe shook his head. "Lord Jaxom has offered to take Camo on in the main beasthold at Ruatha for a while until all of this . . ." He indicated Tia's ruined arm. "blows over. The man is actually pretty good with runner beasts. He should be happy there and hopefully well away from the influence of those that corrupted him. Menolly is very fond of the poor man and if it seems safe we will eventually bring him back to the harper hall."

Last night Tia had replayed her recording of the attack and combined with what Lord Groghe had told her she believed that the man had been mislead and was not really responsible. "I think I agree with your assessment of that man, Camo, and I'm glad that he will not be punished for what happened."

"I'm glad you feel that way." Lord Groghe gave her a warm half smile. "Now I'll get out of your way so you can finish your breakfast. Jaxom and Ruth are waiting to take you to your ship as soon as you're ready."

~ o ~

Tia was comfortably seated on Ruth's neck between Jaxom and Alex as they climbed into the air above Fort Hold. The next instant all sensory input ceased and a moment of total panic set in as she suddenly found herself experiencing the total sensory deprivation that was every shell person's worst nightmare. The next instant she was looking at a dimly lit control panel and hearing the sounds of her ships air recycling machinery. She fought to regain control of her chaotic emotions as she realized that all communication with her avatar had been cut off and that the automatic safeties in her shell had switched primary sensory input to the simple camera and audio systems mounted on the outside of her shell. Ever since Helva's time all shell people were equipped with this built in failsafe should all contact with external comlink systems be lost. She switched her comlink system back to ship channels and she was once again her ship.

She quickly scanned her surroundings through her ships sensors to reassure herself that she was still safely parked in the Fort Weyr bowl. Momentarily reassured, Tia scanned the sky anxiously looking for any sign of Ruth. Then Ruth popped into existence just above the rim of the bowl. After a moment to calm her worry she reestablished her connection to her avatar. Tia took a few moments to calm her still disturbed emotions and regain control of her avatar. The short jump between had been a terrible jolt and she was still working to calm herself down as Ruth circled in for a landing.

As Jaxom reached around to help Tia down he caught the look in her eyes. "Lady Tia, are you alright?"

She took another moment to compose herself. "I'll be fine. It's just that when you jumped between I lost all contact with this body. It was a very disconcerting experience. I should have expected it but it had never occurred to me what would happen. The last time my avatar was carried between it was under its own internal AI control and I was not linked in." Once they were all dismounted she spoke to Jaxom. "You're welcome to come inside my ship. Replacing this arm shouldn't take very long."

Jaxom accepted her offer and the three of them entered her ship.

**____****Continued in Part 22**

___( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and_'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	22. A New Crisis

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

**********************Chapter 22 : **A New Crisis 

Tia led Jaxom and Alex to the aft workshop. In many ways the cabin reminded Jaxom of one of the Mastersmith's workshops except that most of the tools made no sense to him. He noticed a long narrow crate sitting on a tray next to a clean work bench. Tia climbed onto the workbench then she spoke to the two men. "If you want to remain then you should stay over there beside the hatch so you will be out of the way." Then she lay down and Jaxom clearly saw the life go out of her face as she switched her control links from the Avatar body to her ship systems. As he observed the transformation, Jaxom found it fascinating how blatantly obvious it was whether or not she was '**_in_**' her artificial body.

Tia's voice came out of a speaker in the ceiling. "I should warn you, Lord Jaxom that this body was designed as an integrated whole. The damaged part cannot be simply disconnected. To remove the damaged arm, it will have to be cut off and then temporary couplers will have to be attached to the internal connections in order to attach the replacement arm. It could appear to be a bit gruesome to the uninitiated."

Jaxom merely nodded.

After a moment a servo separated from its niche in the wall and moved over next to her body. It first began cutting away the outer skin of her arm just below the shoulder. The only apparent difference between this procedure and doing it to a living body was the lack of large amounts of blood. Next it started cutting away the artificial muscles.

Alex was the first to look away. "Intellectually I know that this is just a replaceable mechanical body but emotionally all I can see is the woman I love having her arm cut off."

Tia responded sympathetically over the intercom. "I know, Alex. It's often difficult to separate reality from perception. To me this body is as much a part of me as this ship but this has to be done if I want this body to be fully useful. Also it will be less difficult for our friends here on Pern if I can appear, to them, to be relatively undamaged for the remainder of our stay."

Finally the servo picked up a high speed circular surgical saw and began cutting through tubes, wire bundles and the carbon fiber bone. Jaxom soon found it difficult to watch the mangled arm being removed despite his curiosity about the process and he also had to look away. Eventually she was left with a short stub with thousands of wires and tubes just barely sticking out of it.

Next she began installing connectors to the ends of the wires and tubes. This operation was much easier for Alex and Jaxom to watch. It was fascinating watching the thousands of hair fine fiber optic lines being inserted into a special type of connecter at a speed too fast to follow. Next a connector was added to the power lines and finally connectors were added to the thin tubes that carried lubricant to the joints.

Once that was completed similar procedures were performed on the end of the replacement arm so that it could be attached to the stub left of her arm.

~ o ~

An hour and a half after they had begun it was finished. Tia transferred control back to the avatar and surveyed the result. It was obvious that the left and right arms didn't match. The skin tone of the right arm was a little off. The older arm was a lighter shade to match the skin tones of an eight year old girl who had spent her life in space suits and enclosed pressure domes on airless worlds. Her current body had a darker skin tone to match that of her parents who had spent the last two decades exploring ancient ruins on tropical worlds. The older replacement arm also looked just a little less realistic and the seam where it was attached was clearly visible. The old arm had less than a quarter as many sensors as the damaged arm had; making it feel almost numb in comparison to the rest of her body. Also, though it wasn't obvious to Alex and Jaxom, the servos in the old replacement were much less precise than the original's newer artificial muscles making the arm feel more 'clunky' less dexterous.

The simple expedient of an arm band, A souvenir from one of the planets that they had visited, covered the seam but it couldn't conceal the difference in skin color and texture. Despite its shortcomings the old replacement was fully functional and would serve until they got back to Central Worlds and had a new arm made.

Tia looked at the two men and smiled. "Well it's not perfect but it will do." She jumped off the table. "Why don't we see what's going on in the Weyr then we can head back to the Hold."

As they exited the workshop Jaxom glanced back and saw the servo pick up the ruined arm and drop it into some kind of opening in the wall marked [RECYCLE]. The concept made him shiver. Like so many of his friends, he had developed a real affection for this strange woman from beyond their world. No matter how many times he told himself that Tia's body was only a machine, he just couldn't look at her and see her as less than a living person. There was just too much life in those eyes when she was in control.

As they made their way through the ship to the main hatch Jaxom noticed the Tia kept flexing and examining the replacement arm as though trying to get the feel of the new limb. By the time they exited the ship she seemed to have become accustom to the replacement limb.

Once they exited the ship, the three of them headed to the queens weyr to see if there had been any recent developments.

~ o ~

Tia, Alex, Jaxom and Sharra were sitting at a large table inside the Fort Weyrwoman's chambers. Also at the table were N'ton and Margatta of Fort Weyr, F'lar and Lessa of Benden Weyr, Masters Sebell and Menolly of the Harper Hall, and finally Lord Benis and Lady Briala of Fort Hold. Tia couldn't help noticing how the eyes of the others in the room occasionally strayed to her slightly mismatched replacement arm. Some of them even showed faint signs of discomfort when they glanced at it but there was really nothing she could do about it.

N'ton was speaking. "During last night's search the dragons spotted a large number of widely scattered individuals moving stealthily through the undeveloped terrain south of Fort Weyr. They appear to be headed toward the Fort Weyr. At the rate they're moving, they should reach here by tomorrow"

Lessa spoke. "We're trying to keep a discrete eye on those men without them being aware that they have been noticed."

Sebell added. "I have sent a couple of observers on the ground to keep an eye on them as well and if possible get close to one of them and find out their plans."

N'ton spoke again. "To top it off we have threadfall over most of Southern Boll and the very tip of Tillek tomorrow. The timing is just too coincidental. They will be here just when the Weyr is nearly empty fighting thread."

F'lar responded to N'ton's worry. "Benden will be glad to loan Fort a couple of wings so that you can fly thread and guard the Weyr at the same time. I would be proud to fly with your wing tomorrow."

Lessa jumped in. "And I will be here as well to act as backup and liaison between the wings left at Fort and those fighting thread."

"Thankyou Weyrleader F'lar and Weyrwoman Lessa!" N'ton nodded his head in respect as he replied. "I appreciate Benden's help in this situation and I look forward to flying thread with you again F'lar."

Sebell remarked at this point. "I will return to the Harper Hall but I thought Menolly could stay here in the Weyr. That way we could keep you up-to-date through her firelizards on what those men I have on the ground discover."

Lord Benis, who had remained, relatively, quiet up 'til now, finally remarked. "You will have the full support of Fort Hold, Weyrleader N'ton. Just let myself or my father know what we can do to help."

"I will keep that in mind Lord Benis, thank-you." N'ton responded.

"I also feel that I should be here to represent the Lord Holders should anything important happen." Lord Benis paused a moment before continuing. "That is if you have a rider to spare to bring me back tomorrow."

Lessa spoke up. "I will be happy to stop by and pick you up tomorrow on my way here."

Tia jumped in. "Alex and I are going back to Fort Hold for the night but we would like to come back tomorrow morning." She glanced over at Alex to see if he had any objections and he only nodded his approval.

Jaxom smiled at Tia as he remarked. "Since I also plan to be here tomorrow for the same reason as Lord Benis, I will be pleased to give you and Alex a ride."

N'ton nodded to everyone in the room. "Then it is settled. We will meet here tomorrow a couple of hours before threadfall."

"Agreed." Everyone else responded nearly in unison.

Just before the meeting broke up, Tia noticed Menolly and Briala whispering then Briala touched the scars on her cheek and the two girls exchanged knowing smiles. Tia found herself wondering what that was all about as they left the room.

~ o ~

A short time later Alex, Tia, Benis, Briala and Sebell were standing in a field before the Harper Hall waving to their friends as three dragons, a bronze, a gold and a white, climbed into the air above them then, as one, blinked out of existence. Menolly had remained at Fort Weyr for the night.

The group on the ground turned to see Lord Groghe striding toward them. Sebell headed into the Harper Hall while the rest joined up with Groghe. As they walked back to the hold Benis filled his father in on what had transpired back at the Weyr. Meanwhile Menolly and Lady Briala seemed to take charge of Tia and Alex.

Tia finally gave in to her curious streak. "I hope I'm not prying but I noticed there seemed to be some kind of undercurrent between you two and, um . . ." Her voice trailed off as she failed to come up with an innocuous way to refer to the marks on Briala's cheek.

Lady Briala quickly brushed her cheek as she displayed an understanding smile. "A reminder of a time when Lord Benis and I were young, foolish, and full of ourselves." She reached out and stroked the head of the golden firelizard that rode on Menolly's shoulder. "Isn't that right, Beauty."

That was all either of Tia's two companions would say on the matter. The rest of that day Tia and Alex visited hold and hall reassuring everyone that she had survived the attack and was doing well.

~ DRnBS ~

The next morning Alex and Tia arrived at Fort Weyr riding behind Jaxom on Ruth. Lord Benis, Lord Groghe and Masterharper Sebell arrived astride Golden Ramoth. Lord Groghe had insisted that since any serious legal actions required at least three Lord Holders that he should be there. With the presence of Sebell there would be representatives of Hold, Weyr and Crafthall.

The floor of the Weyr was filled with dragons and riders preparing for threadfall. Soon enough the air was full of dragonwings as they took to the air then they vanished between. There was still over a dozen dragons and riders, Including Lessa and Ramoth, left behind to deal with the invaders should they make it into the Weyr.

Overnight Sebell had received word from one of his spies that the individuals moving toward Fort Weyr were, indeed, Abominators and that they intended to invade the Weyr while the dragonriders were out fighting thread and try to destroy Tia's ship. Lord Benis had been awakened in the middle of the night and given a copy of that report. He had immediately sent out a large contingent of guards/soldiers. Hopefully they would be able to intercept the invaders just as they tried to break into the Weyr.

As Lessa kept them up to date on the current battle with thread, they waited for things to develop on the ground with the invaders. Unexpectedly, a dark shape appeared in the air above them and Markath glided unsteadily down to land with an inelegant thump before them.

Lessa looked at him in surprise and a hint of wonder. "How did you?! . . . Dragons don't start learning to fly until they are a half turn old and they don't learn to jump between 'til they are a full turn."

'_I wanted to be here for Hypatia_.' Markath responded simply. '_I did what I had to do to get here_.'

Tia was touched by the sincerity and concern that she felt in Markath's mind. She was also surprised that he was now as big as Alex. Markath then launched himself and glided unsteadily over to where Tia's ship sat. After another inelegant but better landing Markath positioned himself as though standing guard over her ship. Tia could now sense a determined, self-satisfied feel in his mind. Ramoth took wing and landed beside Markath. The two comically mismatched dragons looked at each other and exchanged a curt nod then returned to their alert pose.

Those watching had to laugh at the image then Lessa remarked. "I don't think anyone will get through to your ship with those two standing guard." Lessa paused looking into space then spoke to those around her. "The invaders have reached the base of the Weyr. The Fort Hold men are closing in on them."

Tia was able to overhear the reports by the firelizards and the watch dragon.

The next instant the rest of the dragons and riders, that had stayed behind, took wing and a moment later vanished.

After a few minutes the dragons began returning carrying bedraggled and unhappy men in their claws and depositing them in one of the more isolated animal pens over in a corner of the Weyr floor. Then they would take off again and disappear. A few of the dragons had men in the livery of Fort Weyr guards sitting behind the dragonrider. Three of the dragons remained and stood guard over the captured invaders along with eight of Lord Benis' men. The operation continued for several more minutes until there was a total of thirty-four very sullen and a little worse for wear prisoners inside the animal pen.

A few hours later threadfall was over. Other than a few very minor threadscores the dragons and riders came through it unscathed. Now the walls and rim of Fort Weyr were overloaded with dragons. All of the Weyrleaders and over half of the Lord Holders were present. Most of the Craftmasters were also present. They all felt, some with just a hint of fear, that what happened here could have serious repercussions for Pern. A raised platform and table had been set up on the bowl floor. Seated at the center was Lord Holder Benis. To his right sat Lord Holder Jaxom and to his left sat Lord Groghe. The first order of business, since this gathering was complete enough to make anything done here official, was Lord Groghe's announcement that he was turning Fort hold over to his son Benis and officially retiring. Next to Groghe sat Lord Holder Larad of Telgar Hold. On the other side of Jaxom sat Masterharper Sebell, Mastersmith Terry and the newly elected Minecraft Master. At the end sat Weryleaders F'lar of Benden, F'nor of Fort and K'van of Southern. At the other end sat Tia and Alex. Nine judges and the accusers.

The trial ended up being fairly short and straight forward. Tia testified about her experience, the mismatched arm mute testimony to the seriousness of the attack. Sebell's observers and two of Fort Hold's guards testified about what they had seen and heard. Even Camo, with Menolly's gentle encouragement, told what he had done and why. He even identified the other man that had misled him among the invaders. In the end the invaders were all sentenced to banishment. With Tia's impassioned defense, Lord Groghe's judgment that Camo should not be held responsible was upheld by the court.

**____****Continued in Part 23**

___( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and_'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	23. Many Farewells

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

**********************Chapter **23 : Many Farewells 

Tia and Alex watched the dragons taking off carrying away the prisoners that had been sentenced to exile. She turned to Jaxom who was also watching the dragons fly away and observed his face for a moment. She could see that he was ill at ease and that set her wondering. "Where will they take them? What will happen to their families?"

Jaxom took a deep shuddering breath then looked over at Tia. "The dry land makes up less than an eighth of the planet. More than half of Pern's surface is taken up by the 'Great Eastern Sea' and the 'Great Western Sea' which are really the same body of water that some have begun calling simply the 'Great Sea'. There are literally thousands of inhabitable islands in hundreds of chains scattered throughout the Great Sea. Because of ocean currents, countless unseen reefs and general weather conditions no ship's captain in his right mind would risk sailing into those waters. Even if one were foolhardy enough to attempt going there it would take several centuries to search all those islands. That is where those people will be dropped and only the dragonrider that drops them off knows which island." There was a hint of sadness in his face. "If the criminal identifies himself then his family will be contacted and given the option to go into exile with the criminal. Most of the time the family declines the offer." He looked down at the ground and sighed. "It is a harsh and terrible thing, banishment, and only the very worst are condemned to that fate. We do not hand out that sentence lightly. There is no reprieve because no one will ever know which of those thousands of islands you were sent to or which dragonrider transported you. Even the dragonrider that drops you off will probably forget exactly which island you were left at within a turn or two."

Jaxom's description made even Tia shiver in her avatar body as she watched the last of the condemned carried away on dragon back. Jaxom turned to Alex and Tia making a visible effort to shake off the slightly depressed air that clung to the group that remained on the Weyr floor. Then Tia caught a bit of Ruth's reactions to Jaxom's slight depression. Ruth was trying to console his rider.

Markath came gliding over to join the small group. Tia could already see a noticeable improvement in his stability in the air but his landing was still awkward. As Markath stopped before them Jaxom reached out and scratched him right behind the headknobs where, it seemed, all dragons liked such attention.

Jaxom cocked his head and a ghost of a smile appeared on his face. "I find it incredible how fast this little guy is developing." He gave a short chuckle. "You have shown over half a turn's worth of development in, what has it been, just over four days." He shook his head. "Amazing."

He noticed F'lar and Lessa taking off with Lord Groghe, Lord Benis, Masterharper Sebell and Masterharper Menolly. "Now, I believe it is getting late and we should be getting back to Fort Hold." He called to Ruth who swooped down to land beside them. "Shall we go?"

The three of them climbed onto Ruth and, as soon as they were settled, he leaped into the air. Markath leapt into the air a heartbeat later. After only two sweeps of his wings Ruth jumped between. This time Tia was ready. As unnerving as the lack of sensory input was, she knew that it would not last for long so she prevented the automatic switch of her comlinks and simply counted off the beats until sensory input from her avatar returned.

She had only counted to three when the world returned and they were gliding over Fort Hold. A second later Markath appeared beside them. Tia sensed approval from Ruth and a bit of excitement coming from Markath.

'_You are doing well._' Ruth told Markath.

'_Jumping Between is fun_.' Markath responded.

'_How did you learn so quickly?_' Ruth inquired.

'_I listened in when the other dragons jumped._' Markath replied smugly.

Tia and Jaxom both laughed at the interchange between Ruth and Markath as Ruth began a curving approach to the Fort Hold courtyard. Tia noticed that Markath was working very hard to maintain his position off of Ruth's left wing as they descended. In his mind she detected emotions very similar to a youngster trying to both imitate and impress a respected elder. She could also detect Ruth's amusement at Markath's attitude.

Ruth angled down and glided straight toward the enclosed courtyard then at the last second back winged neatly into a 90 degree turn and a perfect landing, The maneuver placed the main hold entrance just to his right while leaving plenty of room to his left. Markath attempted to execute the same maneuver and was only partially successful. Markath tried to maintain as much dignity as possible as he righted himself. Tia heard Ruth's remark to the little embarrassed black dragon. '_You did well for your first attempt little one. With time and practice, you will master your landings_.'

Jaxom, Alex and Tia dismounted and headed into the hold. Ruth launched himself and flew up toward the Fort Hold fire heights followed closely by Markath as Jaxom, Alex and Tia entered the hold. Lord Benis, now officially Lord Holder of Fort met them just inside the door. "Welcome back to Fort Hold. What do you say to sharing a skin of fine Benden Wine." He lowered his voice a bit and a look of sympathy crossed his face. "It will take a bit of the edge off of today's onerous duties. That is one element of being a Lord Holder that I do not find in the least enjoyable." He started to lead them toward one of the inner rooms.

Jaxom nodded. "That sounds like a fine idea."

~ o ~

Alex leaned back and smiled at Tia. They had spent the last hour sitting in this comfortable chamber sipping a very fine white wine and sharing companionable conversation with some new friends. Benis' wife Briala and Lord Groghe had joined them just a few minutes after they had settled in. They were now on their third skin of wine and everyone was feeling relaxed. Since Tia could neither truly taste it nor be affected by it, she was the only one not drinking but she was enjoying the companionship just as much. Tia had also been aware that Ruth and Markath had been carrying on their own conversation up on the fire heights. Among other things Ruth had been giving Markath advice on such things as flight and landing techniques. It seemed that Ruth had taken on a mentor like attitude toward Markath.

Groghe leaned toward Alex and Tia. "When are you planning to depart our little planet?" He asked.

Though the inquiry had taken her by surprise, Tia quickly responded. "Alex and I have discussed it and we are hoping to leave tomorrow. I wish we could stay a lot longer but we still have a large number of lost colonies we have to survey and it will take several years to complete this current mission."

Jaxom jumped in. "I hope you will be able to delay your departure 'til late tomorrow. I know that N'ton and Margatta would like to give you a proper sendoff and there are a lot of people that will miss you and would like to see you one last time before you leave."

Tia felt Ruth's comment in her head. '_I will miss you as well._'

Markath chimed in. '_I will also miss you after you leave._' There was a pause then he continued, responding to Tia's unspoken emotional response. '_I wish I could go with you but we both know that would be unwise. I am not even a full sevendays old. I am still growing very fast and your ship has very limited space._ '

"I think we can delay our departure until tomorrow evening?" Alex replied to Jaxom with a nod then glanced curiously at Tia.

Tia replied back to Markath, her voice tinged with melancholy. '_I do wish I could take you with me._' Then aloud she responded to Jaxom. "Tomorrow evening sounds fine with me."

Alex continued looking at Tia. Though no one else had noticed, he had detected a hint of sadness in her voice and the look in her face suggested to him that she might be communicating with the dragons.

'_I know._' Markath responded to Tia. '_But I am a dragon of Pern and this is where I belong._'

'_You have not impressed; you have no rider; what will you do with yourself?_' She expressed her main concern.

'_Ruth has been teaching me how to be a proper Pern dragon. Also Talen and I have developed a very close friendship in the last few days and I think I will enjoy a life at sea._' Markath replied.

'_As long as you are happy_.' Tia remarked, relieved that Markath had a positive future available to him. He would not be left totally alone after she was gone. Tia then heard Ruth relaying a message about their planned departure to all the Weyrleader's dragons. A few minutes later Markath suddenly left Fort Hold announcing that F'lar and Mnementh were taking Talen to some place on the southern continent and he was following.

Soon they all retired to the main hall for dinner and to make plans for tomorrow.

~ DRnBS ~

Tia and Alex looked around appreciatively at the floor of Fort Weyr. The entire place was set-up as a Farewell Gather in honor of Alex and Tia. Most of the Weyrleaders, Lord Holders and Craftmasters were here.

Mnementh swooped in for a landing carrying Sailingmaster Talen, his two children and a frail looking woman. Markath came in for a landing right beside Mnementh. Talen and his children dismounted first then took extra care helping the frail looking woman down. As the group approached, Tia noticed that Markath was staying very close to the woman. They came over to where Tia and Alex were standing. Talen introduced the woman with him. "Lady Tia, Master Alex, this is my wife Corena. She has been down in Cove Hold recovering from a bout of Firehead Fever for the last few weeks. She is still a bit weak but she insisted on meeting you. You already know my two children."

"It is nice to meet you." Tia greeted Corena. "I have enjoyed knowing the rest of your family."

Corena spoke in a quiet voice. "I am very glad to finally meet you both. We've heard a lot of rumors about you at Cove Hold. F'lar brought Talen down to visit me last night and he told me all about you. Yesterday the Masterhealer pronounced me well enough to travel between so Talen brought me back with him this morning." She glanced over at Markath. "Markath arrived in Cove Hold last night shortly after Talen got there and has been watching over me like a wherry hen since then." She scratched his head. "He's such an unusual dragon."

~ o ~

The impromptu Fort Weyr Farewell Gather turned out to be a very enjoyable affair. Tia and Alex were surprised at how many prominent people of Pern showed up to say their farewells to them and thank them for all they had done for Pern. During the entire occasion, the two largest golden queens of Pern, Ramoth and Ludeth, stood honor guard beside Tia's ship.

Tia noticed that everyone was very aware of her rather obvious replacement arm. Tia rushed to reassure each of them that she did not blame anyone and there was nothing to worry about. Soon the incident was successfully pushed into the background and the emotional atmosphere of the gather brightened.

Once again the Harper hall contingent performed 'The Ballad of Lady Starship Hypatia and Starship Master Alexander' as well as a newer, very stirring version of the second part of the ballad that gave a more extensive description of how Hypatia saved Pern from what could have been the most disastrous threadfall ever. After the songs were completed Sebell read to the assembled group a copy of Tia's report on Pern that she had given him. They were pleased by her description as well as relieved by her recommendations. Next they launched into a few more songs that she had not heard before and Tia found herself thinking that she was acquiring quit a repertoire of music from Pern.

There were also a few gifts presented to Alex and Tia. Among the gifts they were each presented with wide metal armbands like those that were currently very popular among the people of Pern The armbands contained an image of her ship and a dragon in flight. Tia immediately placed hers over the point where her replacement arm had been attached. There were several other very beautiful samples from the artisans of Pern among the gifts. Alex was also presented with a few large casks of Benden Hold's best wines.

After the evening meal Tia and Alex gather with all of the close friends that they had made during their stay on Pern, (a fair sized group), for one last toast and a round of goodbyes. Then as the gathered crowd watched from a safe distance and waved, Tia and Alex boarded her ship. A few minutes later she slowly and majestically lifted off from the Weyr floor and ascended straight up until she was lost in the clear evening sky.

~ DRnBS ~

It had been over a day since they had left the Pern system behind and Alex had broken out a bit of the Benden wine to celebrate as they talked about their short stay on Pern. Tia had stowed her avatar and was now the ship as she prepared for the upcoming dive through the nearby singularity.

Alex raised his wine glass in salute toward the main viewscreen which showed the still bright star that was Pern's sun. "To the indomitable people of Pern." Alex took a sip then glanced toward the center column and raised his glass toward her. "And to you, my beautiful Lady Starship Hypatia, a very kind and generous soul."

Tia replied. "No more than anybody else. Those people needed help so I gave them what I could."

Alex shook his head. "Not so 'My love'. I happen to know that those five power cells that you gave them are specifically designed for the shell person program and together are worth as much or more than that new avatar body of yours."

After a longer than normal pause, Tia responded. "I was glad to do it. Those power cells were the only thing that was small enough, powerful enough and reliable enough to fill the necessary requirements. To be honest, I don't really know why I bought all those spares in the first place. I just look on it as fate that I happened to have exactly what they needed, exactly when they needed it. Besides with 75 percent ownership of Moto-Prosthetics and the shipload of bonuses and royalties that I have racked up over the last several years; I am so disgustingly rich that I can afford to be generous."

Alex tilted his head as a soft smile played across his face. "That may be so but there are many people with far more wealth than you that wouldn't lift a finger to help the people of that planet, much less spent that kind of credits for them. You however gave freely to them without so much as batting an eye. And don't give me any of that 'disgustingly rich' malarkey. I have a fair idea how much you are worth and how much those power cells cost. That was quite a bit more than just pocket change you gave away back there. So my toast still stands." Again he raised his glass then took a sip of the wine. He grinned. "Mmmmmm, very good wine." He again cocked his head as he looked straight at the video pickup on the central column. "You really need to get those eggheads at Moto-Prosthetics to develop a true taste sensor so that you can try this wine. It is amazing." He looked back at the screen and turned a bit more somber. "Of all the fantastic places we have seen, I think I will really miss that place and those people the most."

Tia responded. "I too will miss them . . . Especially Markath, Ruth and Jaxom." She paused then announced in a brighter tone. "Now finish that bit of wine and strap yourself in. We'll be approaching the singularity very soon."

**____****Concluded in Part 24**

___( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and_'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


	24. Epilog : The Return

******Dragonship****  
**_By Thomas Mc_**  
**

* * *

**Epilog : The Return**

It had been a long and difficult project. Six and a half years surveying 153 lost colonies. The statistics from that trip had not been particularly up-beat. They had only found a total of 42 still active colonies. Only 16 of them, including Pern, could really be described as thriving. Unfortunately, 5 of those still active colonies had a population that could be said to have gone seriously and brutally off the deep end as a society.

They had found 36 failed colonies that had been wiped out by disease; another 8 had been wiped out by natural disaster; 25 colonies had died out with no explainable cause for their demise; they found 18 that had simply been abandoned with no indication where the population had gone. They found 23 cases where the colonists never arrived at their destination; and finally there was one example where the reported destination turned out to be empty space with the closest star system over three light-years away. That one had left them scratching their heads.

But now the project was finally finished and Tia was once again skated through the singularity skimming along the edges of reality like a surfer shooting the curl with practiced ease. There was a sense of joy in her heart because, for the first time in the last six and a half years they had been on this mission, Tia knew exactly what awaited at the end of this dive through chaos. She and Alex were looking forward to seeing this destination again.

Tia burst from the colorful chaos of the singularity into the starry blackness of real space. Before her, one star shined much brighter than all the rest. She felt a warm glow as she gazed upon the star that she had last seen four and a half years ago.

Tia's reverie was interrupted when she felt a whisper of a scan then she was startled by a very annoying burst of discordant tones filling every known communications band. This was followed by a message demanding her registry ID and stating that this area of space was interdicted and ordering her to leave this location.

Startled by this turn of events, Tia transmitted her identification. The interdiction warnings immediately ceased and a new message announced that she was cleared for access to this system and had permission to proceed.

Alex looked over at her central column and shrugged. "It seems that Central Worlds has received our preliminary report on this place and has already acted on it." He shook his head. "I thought it would take the bureaucracy a couple of decades to get around to acting on our report."

Tia responded. "That surprises me too. I certainly never expected them to put me on an exceptions list."

"That is surprising. It's so uncharacteristically thoughtful of them. But I'm glad they did. It means that we can return here whenever we have the free time to do so." Alex smiled wistfully. "I'm looking forward to seeing all of our friends again."

"Jump drive system secured." Tia announced as several indicator lights ceased changing states and the control board was again green, quiet and peaceful. Then the door of her tiny coffin sized storage closet in the corner of the control cabin opened and Tia's avatar stepped out into the cabin. Tia caught the flicker in his eyes as for a moment those eyes were drawn to her temporary replacement arm. It happened every time she entered his presence. Tia looked over at the image of the star Rukbat that dominated the main view screen. "I wonder how much has changed since the last time we were here."

Alex saw her catch his glance but he couldn't help noticing this obvious indication of her avatar's artificial nature. He shrugged. "I guess we will find out in two and a half days when we get there." He responded as he quickly scanned the control board one more time. "All systems green and the AI's are now in command of the ship. Alex turned toward Tia's avatar, a wicked glint in his eye. "Two and a half days. I wonder what we can possibly do to pass the time?"

Tia met his glint with a gleam of her own as her voice took on a rather sultry tone. "Oh, I'm sure we can come up with something to while away the time . . . Don't you?" She cocked her head toward the hatchway that led down to the common living quarters and the sleeping quarters. Her eyebrows rode up and down her forehead suggestively as a very sexy smile graced her face. Then she turned toward the indicated hatchway.

Alex jumped up from his seat and placed his arm around her waist then they both moved toward the hatch. They both stopped for a moment as they were passing through the hatch and glanced back at the main viewscreen for one more, quick, glimpse at image of their destination.

They smiled at each other then continued down through the hatchway to continue the playful diversion that they had just begun.

~ DRnBS ~

The next two days passed quickly and as they approached the outer fringes of the ort cloud that surrounded the Rukbat star system. Tia took over control of her ship to guide it through the thick cloud. Soon they soon were deep in the ort cloud and the ship was filled with the whisper of the ice crystals hitting her hull.

Alex gave a little shiver at the eerie sound and commented on it. "There is just something so creepy about that sound, Tia."

Tia felt a ghost of a nonexistent tingle to match his shiver. "I know what you mean. In all the time we have been together we have never encountered anything like this and I've never found a mention of anything like it in the Central Worlds records."

Alex nodded his head and grinned up at her central column. "Even if that warning satellite didn't dissuade an invader, I bet encountering this ort cloud would."

Within minutes after they passed through the ort cloud, Tia's control board lit up indicated that she was being scanned from somewhere in the direction of Pern. Tia immediately recognized the format of that scanning beam. She glanced over at Alex. "It seems they got their asteroid detector system functioning."

Alex grinned as he scanned the board. "I guess this means they will be expecting us when we arrive at Pern."

"I would expect so." She replied with a hint of a laugh in her voice. "We'll be entering orbit around Pern in a bit over an hour.

Two seconds later Tia felt a familiar presence as Markath's happy voice invaded her mind. '_Tia, you're back! I've missed you these last four turns_.'

'_Hello, Markath. I'm glad to hear from you again_.' Tia responded.

Then Tia felt a deepening of the contact with Markath and saw the memory of her last view of the main cargo hold pop up in her mind. '_I'll be there in just a moment_.' Markath remarked then the connection blinked out of existence before she could respond. Two seconds later an alarm sounded as a couple of indicators flashed telling them that there had been a major shift in the mass in her main cargo hold. The contact returned as she shut off the alarm. '_I'm here in your main cargo hold._'

A quick glance through the main cargo hold sensor verified that Markath was indeed there. '_Wow_.' She thought. '_He got bigger_.' Markath had heard her thought and she felt his laughter in her mind. She grabbed Alex. "Markath is down in the main cargo deck." She told him and they both headed below.

As they looked over their guest Alex commented. "Wow, you've grown."

Markath was now a bit over three meters long and his wingspan was up to five meters. The cargo compartment was just a bit cramped for him. He folded his wings as tightly to his body as he could and settled into a more comfortable position. '_It seems that you were right when you thought it would not be a good idea to take me with you_.' Tia and Alex both heard his comment in their minds.

Tia smiled at her black dragon friend whose head was now level with her and Alex. "So what do you do with yourself now?" She asked him.

Markath responded to them both. '_I now split my time between helping with the asteroid surveillance project and the Landing archive project with many visits to Talen's family where I occasionally help in their shipping business. I was on the Yokohama when the scanning satellites detected your arrival. They are all expecting you and have invited you to land at Fort Weyr. Jaxom, F'lar and N-ton will be meeting you when you reach Pern orbit and hope to ride down with you._'

For almost an hour, while Tia's servos installed extra seating in her control cabin, Tia, Alex and Markath talked about what had been happening over the last four and a half years.

Markath told them that he had learned that he could not chew firestone after his first disastrous and very messy attempt. The healers figured out that the special stomach that the dragons use to create the phosgene gas from firestone is completely undeveloped in him and the mess had just come back up. They had also discovered that his black hide seemed to be impervious to thread. Although he couldn't fight thread directly he could make himself useful delivering replacement Agenothree tanks to the Queens' wing and he could fly up near the edge of space to report on the shifting of threadfall patterns.

Markath also bragged that he had a perfect sense of relative position in space and always knows exactly where his is. He was capable of making jumps to an exact three dimensional point even if he has never been there or seen his destination. Also his jumps, when he made them based on three dimensional coordinates rather than visual references, always seem to be nearly instantaneous with almost no time spent between. He told them about the latest efforts to restore the Yokohama and use it as a research station and control center for the satellite system. Jast year they added three small weather satellites to more accurately track the weather patterns on Pern and to give them advanced warning of any severe storms. Eventually they one day hoped to use the Yokohama as a jumping off point to explore the other planets in the Rukbat system.

Markath paused then announced that they were approaching Pern and he had to return to the Yokohama but he assured them that he would come down later to see them after they had landed. The next instant he was gone.

Tia and Alex returned to the control room just as the AI put her ship into orbit. Shortly after that, two great bronze dragons and a small white dragon appeared near her, each carrying a space suited figure. Tia opened her main airlock outer hatch in invitation. Soon the five friends were hugging and clasping hands as Tia and Alex were welcomed back to Pern. Then Tia returned her avatar to its storage closet and shifted her control to her ship as the others strapped in for the ride down.

Tia did her best to make the ride down to the surface fun (meaning she showed off a bit).

~ o ~

Fort Weyr was full of Dragons and Dragonriders, Craft Masters and Lord Holders that had arrived at the last minute to welcome Tia and Alex back to Pern. Once she had landed, Mnementh, Lioth and Ruth took up honor guard positions around her ship.

Imediately after she greeted everyone that had come to see her Tia informed them that Central Worlds had received her preliminary report on Pern and had agreed to her recommendations. The Rukbat system was now interdicted until such time as the inhabitants of Pern announce that they wished to make contact with the rest of the Federation. Tia also told them that she and Alex had apparently been officially exempted from the interdiction so they would be able to come back for a visit occasionally and maybe bring in any unique items that Pern might need. When asked how long they would be staying this time Tia informed them that they would only be able to stay for a few days.

As they were brought up to date on the latest news of Pern, Tia and Alex were both sad to learn that Lord Groghe had passed between from old age less than a turn ago.

Later that evening T'cab on bronze Radeth and T'ia on green Cornath arrived at Fort Weyr bringing their parents Talen and Corena. Talen bragged that T'cab was now a wing leader at Benden Weyr. He also told them that Corena was his first mate on his new ship.

Markath arrived at Fort Weyr about an hour later to join the welcoming party.

Later when they were alone for a few minutes Lessa asked Tia about her replacement arm. Tia told her that she had become more or less used to it but she was looking forward to getting back to Central Worlds and have it properly repaired.

~ o ~

While on Pern Tia spent a half day at Landing in the Southern Continent with F'lar, Lessa, Markath and Master Sebell. The AIVAS Center was now maintained by the Harpercraft and had been turned into the major record keeping facility for all of Pern. Lessa told them about the artificial intelligence that had occupied the center's systems when it had first been uncovered. She told Tia about the loss of AIVAS when Masterharper Robinton died.

Tia examined the main AIVAS console for a moment. "I remember reading about those AIVAS systems. They were the most sophisticated artificial intelligence systems ever created. They were the closest the AI people ever came to creating true sentience in a machine. They quit making them shortly after Pern was colonized."

"Why would they do that?" Lessa asked.

"The AIVAS systems turned out to be too unpredictable." Tia replied. "They tended to develop emotions and unique personalities but it was impossible to predict exactly what type of personality they would develop. After several nasty disasters, especially among the systems sold to the military, the whole project was scrapped. Based on the type of self-defense capability he had, I think your AIVAS system was a military model that was wiped and reprogrammed for the Pern expedition."

Lessa responded. "But Aivas was very friendly and helpful." She glanced at the console. "I still miss him."

Tia paused a while deep in thought then glanced at the others. "I have an idea." Her avatar froze as Tia linked her AI system to the AIVAS system and started exploring. She found the root kernel of the original system. She also found a large chunk of empty memory where the AIVAS personality had once resided."

Tia's avatar came back to life. She glanced around. "The personality matrix is gone but I think I can reactivate the system with a stable personality." She looked at her friends. "Would you like me to try?"

They looked at each other a moment. Finally Sebell shrugged then nodded. "If you think you can do it . . ." He glanced at Lessa. ". . . then go ahead."

Tia's avatar again froze as she dived into the AIVAS system then, using her own AI's, she downloaded a copy of her own memories into the empty Personality matrix location. During this process there was a growing, and very disconcerting, feeling of being in two places at once. Tia began to fear that had gotten herself into something she couldn't handle. Once the download was complete Tia had become completely disoriented and the system restarted itself without any conscious action on her part. For an instant Tia felt as though she was the AIVAS system and she looked around in surprise through the AIVAS sensors. She tried to break free but it was like fighting her way up stream against an impossibly strong current. Then she was literally ejected from the system. It took her a couple of seconds to recover from the shock of finding herself as her ship again. She regained control of her avatar. "It's running." She announced a bit shakily.

The others tried speaking to the console but there was no response. Ten minutes later they had just about given up, thinking the attempt had been a failure, when AIVAS responded with Tia's voice. After the initial shock of hearing Tia's voice coming from the AIVAS console, they all began talking to it at once. They all soon realized that Aivas was alive again but with Tia's personality.

The rest of that day was very exciting as many of the important people of Pern visited Landing to get reacquainted with the new reawakened Aivas. Soon many of those present began referring to the AIVAS system as Tia Aivas or Tiavas half in jest but the name soon stuck.

Tiavas actually seemed to be pleased by the name they gave her. She had memories of being Tia and memories of being Aivas. Her personality became a combination of the two with the Tia part being the dominant factor.

~ o ~

All too soon it was time again For Tia and Alex to leave. This time the farewell party was a smaller more intimate affair of fourteen people gathered in the larger of Tia's cargo holds. Lord Holder Benis and Lady Briala, Lord Holder Jaxom and Lady Sharra, F'lar and Lessa, N'ton and Margatta, Sebell and Menolly, Talon and Markath were all present.

After drinking a toast to friendship, Alex looked around and commented. "When I finally become too old to go gallivanting around the universe with you I may want you to just drop me off here."

Tia Snorted. "You'll never be that old, My love." She paused. "But it is a very enticing thought." She smiled at the rest. "In the short time I have spent here Pern has come to feel almost like a second home to me. There is no doubt that I will be back."

Jaxom spoke up with a smile. "In a way, Tia, you will always be with us. You are Lady Starship Hypatia, an important new part of our culture, and soon our history. You also left a large part of yourself in the AIVAS system. She may just be a copy but she is definitely you."

"She feels more like a little sister to me." Tia remarked. "But she does have a lot of me in her."

An hour later Alex was at the pilot's seat and Tia was her ship self as they sped away from Pern. She was sad to see Pern dwindling behind her but she knew that they would be back. She had plans to have a new simpler avatar constructed while her own avatar was being repaired. That new avatar she would bring back to Pern and connect it up to the AIVAS system.

**____****The End  
(For Now)  
**

___( rev 130520 )_

* * *

___'_**_The Ship Who Searched_**_' __and _'**_The Dragonriders of Pern_**_' __and their characters are owned by Anne & Todd McCaffery and Del Ray Books. No infringement on copyrights is intended. (I'm only borrowing the characters and promis not to damage them, too much.) This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be freely used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given._


End file.
